Source
r/pokemon•
QuantumElectronicsDu

Idea for Pokémon Switch: Battle strategy tracking!

Discussion

Overall the thought starts as more of a nice touch than anything else, but ultimately could be embedded deeper into the gameplay both for online competitive purposes and offline challenges.

What the game should keep track of

  • Which Pokémon you use most often

  • What their levels are relative to every challenge you face

  • How often you use certain moves, whether they're status or damaging, whether they're super/not-very effective, and whether they're the same type as the Pokémon using it

  • How often you switch out Pokémon, and whether or not it leads to defensive type advantage

  • How often abilities get activated

  • How close your more difficult matches come to draw or defeat

  • Seemingly random battles may get recorded in full

What the game should do with this information

For purely cosmetic / game-feel purposes:

  • Against milestone challenges (i.e. gym leaders, main characters, tournaments, etc.), NPCs may mention things about your battle style based on recent statistics (i.e. "That's an amazingly powerful Charizard you've got there" [for people who over-rely on a single powerful Pokémon] or "The way your Pachirisu uses Nuzzle to paralyze your opponents is brilliant" [for people who employ a favorite strategy] or "It looks like you've really mastered type advantages" [for people who switch Pokémon often and have a high ratio of super-effective move use]).

Making the game feel like it's actually responding to you instead of just running you through a script seems like a relatively small thing, but it makes a big difference in how much players enjoy the game. (Example: Shadow of Mordor keeps track of how you kill Uruks, how often you run away, etc. and has Uruks banter about it).

  • If it seems like you might be struggling, NPCs can give you targeted encouragement and advice about how to do better.

  • Some of your battles appear on TV, with commentary added about the match -- i.e. who's faster, who's got the advantage, how this move might have changed the outcome, etc.

For challenge/hard-mode reasons (an option that can be turned on at the beginning of the game but isn't on by default):

  • Milestone challenges may be adapted according to how you battle -- i.e. if you're constantly nailing 1HKOs with super-effective moves, gym leaders or other tough trainers will have a roster change to add a defensive counter; if you've been winning by being over-leveled, tough trainers could have their Pokémon's levels adjusted to match; if you've been winning by favoring use of specific status moves, tough trainers could have their rosters changed to have abilities that make them immune to that status.

For competitive purposes:

  • Rather than just going in blind for battles, when you initiate a competitive battle online, both players will get a moment to get a bit of battle stats overview -- what's statistically their favorite Pokémon, what's statistically their biggest winner, what's statistically their favorite opening move and favorite move overall, etc. and adjust teams for the match.

  • Players can review their own stats to get a feel for what works and what doesn't, rather than just being blind.

For GameFreak's purposes:

  • Player statistics are sent to GameFreak for review, so they can use the information to feed into the design for their next generation game.

  • Top players can be invited to tournaments.

Posted Mar 28, 2018, 6:37 PM UTC

1922
creyk•

I like the idea about you getting the memo about what the opponent's most effective pokemon is in online battles. You could get really pent up trying to take that down and sacrifice valuables pokemon to accomplish it and then your opponent could do retribution with the other pokemon left in his party. Adds a whole new layer of mind games to the game which is great, online battles are about strategy after all.

7
[deleted]•

Also considering that GameFreak's mandatory 3v3 format means that absent the pre-battle communication, battles often come down to luck in type matchups. 6v6 lets you build diverse teams such that the result usually comes down to strategy, but 3v3 gives too much random BS.

5
dingfreshtown•

a feature I've wanted for ages (which ties into your cool ideas) is for the gym leaders/NPCs/whoever to remember if you've lost to them before.

it could be as simple as >"I see your back for more"/>"right then here we go again"/>"won't you ever learn" just something to acknowledge you've lost to them already (and paid prize money).

actually you don't pay prize money do you, you drop your cash in a panic which is stupid

7
[deleted]•

There's something more I'd like to see from gym leaders, but that's another discussion :)

I thought about the taunting thing, then realized GameFreak probably wouldn't put that in a game that's supposed to be for kids. But maybe they could do that in a challenge mode.

4
dingfreshtown•

Yeah I didn’t think that it might be a bit intense/mean for younger players, but it does break my immersion when then just rattle off the same script that I’ve heard 2/3 times already as if they’ve never met me even when they’ve owned me repeatedly

4
[deleted]•

So my thought is that instead of focusing on specific types, gym leaders should epitomize, employ and teach players how to use (and counter) specific strategies. After an optional lesson and some demonstrations and lead-up battles (you can skip the whole lead-up if you want), you can challenge the leader. If you lose, instead of whiting out and dropping money and being warped to the Pokémon center, the gym leader heals your Pokémon on the spot and gives you advice on how to beat him. Then when you challenge him again, he references what he advised before and asks if you're ready to face him.

5
dingfreshtown•

I like it, actual training taking place in the gym -experience how the members improve and maintain under the guidance of the leader

1
Thelonious_Mars•

This could also apply to other story elements - like imagine if you used mostly ground types, then fought Maxie, and he commented something along the lines of "don't you agree there should be more land, since you are a ground type user?" or if you went up against Lance and he says "now let's determine who is the better dragon trainer"

granted it's a lot of variables for the devs to account for, but hey

3
ohnotom•

A cute idea but falls apart when you're trying to apply it to competitive purposes. Getting a sneak peak at your opponent's strategy is a HUGE part of the game and would drastically change the game. We've had changes like this in the past (Team Preview), so I won't say it is completely unreasonable...but seems unlikely.

Similarly, you say "Top players can be invited to tournaments", but what does that mean exactly in this context? We already have that to a degree- if you follow the Pokemon Global Link, we have a few International Challenges a year, and top players receive Championship Points. Players passing a certain threshold of CP are permitted to go to Worlds.

3
KRLW890I'm pretty handy•

I like the idea except for letting opponents view your statistics before a battle in competitive. I really like using unexpected sets, and what is indisputably the best part about strange sets is that you can trick your opponent into making a huge misplay just because they expected something more standard. Oftentimes, what would be a less-than-optimal set can completely make up for itself by surprise factor alone. I think a "strategy preview" would really handicap diversity because, even if it doesn't directly tell your opponent your moveset, it could give them enough hints to piece together what you're planning, so now those less-than-optimal sets are just not good. Then people start using the same sets because anything fun just doesn't work anymore.

But for use ingame to make the characters more immersive, I think it sounds great, especially if the game used it in an optional challenge mode to make the teams of gym leaders/E4/etc. try to counter your playstyle. You know, have the standard difficulty ignore that, but for players who want an extra challenge, it could really be interesting. Heck, we've already seen stuff like this implemented for several generations in the Battle Frontier/Subway/Tree/etc.

2
[deleted]•

My thought on seeing competitor stats is that in GameFreak's forced 3v3 format it usually comes down to random chance in rock/paper/scissors, as opposed to the 6v6 format where you can balance it out.

2
KRLW890I'm pretty handy•

There's already the team preview to allow you to prepare for your opponent. It's not a random r/p/s; good players thrive off of outpredicting their opponents, and that extends to making an educated guess to what your opponent will bring and choosing to bring what will counter that.

That being said, I do really hope GameFreak implements a 6v6 Battle Spot mode on the Switch.

2
Orconus•

I like all of the ideas (always good to have more immersive gameplay), but the last one is the problem. By sending it to GameFreak does the player always have to be connected to WiFi or some other internet access? Also, how would they contact a player who they’ve framed as “the top?”

1
[deleted]•

Ah, good point on that last one. This is still a "napkin-phase" idea so I clearly haven't thought of everything well enough :)

No, demanding always-online connectivity for a game is unacceptable on a portable system.

If the "send to GameFreak" thing would ever happen, it's only to be intermittent, upon connection to the global trade/battle system.

Invitational stuff would be through something in the GTS, like an NPC appears and tells you about the event. But then again I have no idea how this would end up working in practice :P

4
Orconus•

I see what you’re saying, it is a really interesting idea. It would be kinda cool to see people who wouldn’t otherwise go into competitive try their hand at it. (Though GameFreak could try to add a ladder system or something... one day)

1
JustThatGuy100Baby Clown Seal!•

I'd imagine that the GameFreak info would be sent via GameSync.

3
hailwyatt•

I'd love to see this implemented like Forza Drivatars, where the game collects data on how you play and creates an AI version of you and other players you know can race your AI in offline modes.

I think it would be awesome to see a friend's trainer on a route with a level adjusted version of his most recent team using his habits (as described above). Could even be implemented as additional pseudo-rivals, or used in Battle Tree and World Tournament style modes, and for more fleshed out secret base type features.

So much potential!

1
[deleted]•

Indeed.

What you've described seems very much in the realm of possibility, but way too ambitious for the first generation of games starting to do this :)

1
hailwyatt•

Related note: They've certainly opened the door to it with the wormholes. Effectively they mean every player's game is cannon, just an alternate universe. We could potentially see more wormholes where we battle the AI trainers of our friends in a variant of secret bases.

1
ExploreptileSevere Brock-itis•

This sounds amazing as a whole, and that TV idea would really add more to the "rise to fame" aspect of a typical Pokemon experience.

1
hyperion064Team Skull•

I had a similar thought a while back! Like what if a future pokemon game used a machine learning algorithm or something to analyze your game strategy to do that script specific stuff, give advice, and make the later gyms and Elite Four incredibly difficult by having them use strategies/pokemon that will give your team/play style difficulty handling

1
large_snowbear•

I have always wondered why GF doesn't improve the NPC AI in the games but collecting data from the PvP battles online.

1