Pokemon Masters

[RocketSurgery]

I downloaded Masters again a couple of weeks ago because they released Marshadow in it (paired with Korrina). I tried it when it first came out and uninstalled it pretty quickly since I don't much care for this gacha nonsense or the human characters in Pokemon.

But, I wanted to see if I could get Marshadow without spending a dime on this thing, and I'm happy to report that through a combination of start-up bonuses, events, grinding through the limited content this game has (thank arceus for the auto mode), and luck, I was not only able to get Marshadow but essentially fully power it up to 5/5 move level and 6* (which comes with shiny Korrina apparently):

I will say that I do like Korrina's outfit. I would buy that hoody.

As a fun bonus, apparently DeNa didn't expect anyone to bother getting 6* Marshadow so quickly, since I don't think Korrina's face is supposed to turn into a ghost during Marshadow's sync move:

Anyways, I guess I can play this to murk things with Marshadow when I'm bored, and I guess I'll still spend the free gems on pulls, but I pretty much achieved what I wanted and it doesn't seem like the game has much to offer in terms of content once you've grinded through the "story".

 

[Pikachu315111]

As a fun bonus, apparently DeNa didn't expect anyone to bother getting 6* Marshadow so quickly, since I don't think Korrina's face is supposed to turn into a ghost during Marshadow's sync move:

This is her Zenith form, just as Marshadow powers-up and transforms, Korrina transcends her human restraints to become all fighting spirit.

 

[Pikachu315111]

Legends: Arcues sync pairs are coming!

Looks like they're going to use the Space-Time Distortions as an explanation why Hisui trainers are being flung into the future.

Wonder if they'll:

1. Have the player characters. They have both Dawn & Lucas in the teaser trailer so would be strange to have either Rei or Akari be the trainer sent back to the past (while its never specified whether the protag was Dawn or Lucas, also feels strange for them not to be). I suppose they could bend continuity and have both Rei and Akari be from the past and just not the "protag", instead Rei and Akari mistake Dawn and Lucas as the protag and drop the subject when they tell them they aren't.
   
   
2. Address that some of these Hisui trainers are ancestors of some trainers in Pasio.
   
   
3. Do anything with Ingo.

 

[R_N]

They'll likely address #2 & 3 to some extent. It's not like they hide the ancestral connection, if anything that'd be part of the appeal of adding them to Masters.
And Ingo, I feel they'd have to go out of their way to not deal with in any capacity.


As for the player character situation, I'm guessing one of two things based on what the context is of the characters coming in:
-If the idea is the LA story has already started, then they'll pick one of Rei/Akari to be the "player", the one who fell into Hisui and kickstarted everything because without them it's kind of a non-starter, and the other to be the "assistant" like in game. Dawn & Lucas will meet both and they both get to go "Whoa!! Our ancestors?!" followed by "Wait what do you mean the other one is from the future"
-If the idea is the LA story hasn't started yet, then Dawn, Lucas & our OC will play the role of Player stand in while this version of Hisui will have both a native Rei & Akari helping the professor. Basically treat this as a full AU situation

 

[Mex]

The pairs have been revealed as Adaman (& Leafeon) and Irida (& Glaceon).

Master fair pairs, with at least Adaman joining the Trainer Lodge, and from what i've heard Irida will be as well, though i havent seen concrete proof of that.

Can't say im a massive fan of Master Fair pairs in Trainer Lodge, especially when they're brand new additions and not like, Leon who's been around a long time and had a rerun in the past, so they're probably not gonna be going on the monthly Lodge scout for quite some time, if ever

 

[yone]

I'm not a fan of Leafeon/Glaceon in Master fair pairs and i find it a bit malicious to put them right after a quadruple Pokefair scout :(

 

[Mex]

Yeah, I dislike this timing, but at least its only two Master Fair pairs unlike last year's 3

Still don't have SS Lyra...

 

[RocketSurgery]

I guess I shouldn't be surprised that they would add Hisui characters without any Hisuian forms as their mons, and yet

Well, I get to keep hoarding gems until they release a mon I actually care about.

 

[Mex]

So the newest event has released, brings alts for Hoenn Gym Leaders Tate and Liza

The story is honestly pretty fun, brings spotlight to the twins but also has Archie play a pretty prominent role, showing his more sensitive side. I honestly like it quite a lot, and having alts for some characters i'd consider less popular is quite nice too.

Hopefully Galar Villain arc doesn't drop the ball, the last few stories have been pretty enjoyable imo

 

[R_N]

So the newest event has released, brings alts for Hoenn Gym Leaders Tate and Liza

The story is honestly pretty fun, brings spotlight to the twins but also has Archie play a pretty prominent role, showing his more sensitive side. I honestly like it quite a lot, and having alts for some characters i'd consider less popular is quite nice too.

Hopefully Galar Villain arc doesn't drop the ball, the last few stories have been pretty enjoyable imo

I saw from the trailer that he's associated with the Jirachi half of the story, which I thought was cute. It's pretty easy to miss that in ORAS, Archie was given a small backstory moment with Jirachi that Maxie iirc didn't have.

 

[Pikachu315111]

So, this was a surprise (at least to me), they just shadow dropped Nemona (& Pawmot) into Masters a few days ago. No fanfare, no major story (the recent story is the Galar one). She's just here now.

Infact, the only reason I know is because in my Youtube suggestions her Masters battle theme came up.

At least Masters players don't have to wait until the near end of the generation for Paldea trainers.

 

[R_N]

So, this was a surprise (at least to me), they just shadow dropped Nemona (& Pawmot) into Masters a few days ago. No fanfare, no major story (the recent story is the Galar one). She's just here now.

Infact, the only reason I know is because in my Youtube suggestions her Masters battle theme came up.

At least Masters players don't have to wait until the near end of the generation for Paldea trainers.

She has no fanfare because she's not actually available yet.
The update went out, so we know she's in, but she was also added with a bunch of other units because they do the set up a month ahead of time.
IE: the update went up with Leon/Dragapult and Gloria/Cinderace but they didn't get the trailer for their part in the Galar Villain story until a day later, and weren'te avilably until the 30th and 2nd respectively.

We know from Datamines that Nemona is probably going to get a more significant spotlight in about...oh...7 days. For special reasons.

 

[RocketSurgery]

Each month's upcoming new sync pairs and events are pushed and subsequently datamined near the end of the preceding month. This includes all the assets and music, hence why they can be on YouTube despite not being scheduled to release yet.

While I'm in this thread I may as well say I was pleased that I got the newly released Leon + Dragapult on my first multi-pull this morning. I've saved up 4 full "pities" worth of free gems, so it was nice to not burn through an entire set. (Pity = 36.6k gems, the number you need to spend on a particular banner before the game takes pity on you and lets you choose the character+pokemon you were pulling the gacha slot machine for).

 

[Mex]

So, the anniversary pairs have been dropped in the game for datamine to get their hands on, and it's Kanto Neo Champions with the Legendary Birds.

They really decided to do the same thing twice.

As you can probably tell, I'm not the biggest fan of this, especially considering the characters getting the Neo Champion role are Red, Blue and Leaf, one of which is straight up the champion of Kanto.

 

[Pikachu315111]

So, the anniversary pairs have been dropped in the game for datamine to get their hands on, and it's Kanto Neo Champions with the Legendary Birds.

They really decided to do the same thing twice.

As you can probably tell, I'm not the biggest fan of this, especially considering the characters getting the Neo Champion role are Red, Blue and Leaf, one of which is straight up the champion of Kanto.

One? Canonically both Blue and Red have been/are Kanto Champions, and in alternate continuity Leaf has been a Kanto Champion too. So, yeah, having those 3 being "Kanto Neo Champions" feel a tad off as, from what I understood of the concept with the "Galar Neo Champions", its characters who aren't Champions but have the potential to become a future Champion if they so desired. So Red, Blue, and even Leaf don't quite gel with the concept as originally presented.

Also the concept worked with the Galar trainers because the way the Galar League is setup. Hop, Bede, and Marnie were competing in the major yearly competition to potentially become the next Galar Champion. The other Leagues don't work like that, at any time a trainer who defeated the 8 Gyms could challenge them and become the next Champion, no region wide fanfare like Galar puts up.

I think they should stop here with the idea. I think they could do something a bit more creative with the other Regional Legendary Groups instead of trying to force the "Neo Champion" with them. Like for the Legendary Beasts they could reference the Special Manga and have Misty/Suicune, Lt. Surge/Raikou, & Blaine/Entei.

 

[Mex]

One? Canonically both Blue and Red have been/are Kanto Champions, and in alternate continuity Leaf has been a Kanto Champion too. So, yeah, having those 3 being "Kanto Neo Champions" feel a tad off as, from what I understood of the concept with the "Galar Neo Champions", its characters who aren't Champions but have the potential to become a future Champion if they so desired. So Red, Blue, and even Leaf don't quite gel with the concept as originally presented.

I say one because I don't believe Red ever officially took up the position and is never actually counted as the true champion in the games, he's conquered the Kanto Pokemon League but doesn't stand as the Champion.

Blue is, according to one trailer, the "ex-Champion" of Kanto, while Leaf, in Masters, is just a skilled Pokemon Trainer who journeyed around Kanto but either never took on the Elite 4, or just never defeated the Champion.

So yeah, Blue is still used for the Champion fight of the Kanto Champion Stadium so i dislike him being a Neo Champion because of that, but the story will likely just award the champion role to Lance for sake of convenience or something

Also the concept worked with the Galar trainers because the way the Galar League is setup. Hop, Bede, and Marnie were competing in the major yearly competition to potentially become the next Galar Champion. The other Leagues don't work like that, at any time a trainer who defeated the 8 Gyms could challenge them and become the next Champion, no region wide fanfare like Galar puts up.

This doesn't quite hold up imo, considering the original Neo Champions were Calem and Serena, rather than it being introduced with the galarians. Idk what the justification for the Kanto Trainers will be but there likely will be one when the story event releases

 

[Pikachu315111]

This doesn't quite hold up imo, considering the original Neo Champions were Calem and Serena, rather than it being introduced with the galarians. Idk what the justification for the Kanto Trainers will be but there likely will be one when the story event releases

Oh, the dual Greninja things were Neo Champions? Shows how much I pay attention.

Alright, so technically the player character doesn't count as a Champion, a Champion in Masters specifically refers to a character who is used as such in the League challenges. Got it.

Alright, so in that case I guess they can do Neo Champions with the other Regional Legendary Groups, though I'll readjust my thoughts in that it would feel repetitive as it'll mostly just be the player characters and main rivals. Galar was unique as it could just use the Rivals as it had three all who, in the game, were specifically aiming to become Champion. Going to a spoiler box as this creeps into speculation:

Future Neo

Johto: I guess this could be a nice opportunity to give Ethan, Kris, and Lyra a special connecting theme which doesn't include Silver. Kris/Suicune would certainly be paired with Suicune, other two are a toss-up.
Hoenn: This is where we start getting into the repetitiveness, it would be Brandon, May, & Wally.
Sinnoh: Lucas, Dawn, & Barry.
Unova: Now this one is interesting as what would they use, the Swords of Justices or the Forces of Nature (eitherway there's four of them). Now with four they could use this as an opportunity to just have something connecting the BW protags with the BW2 protags. While the games do have enough Rivals to have four (Cheren, Bianca, N, and Hugh), Bianca and Hugh never really showed interest in becoming Champion. Well, with their being two groups of 4 they could do everyone and split it between protags and rivals, or another idea is introduce Benga into Masters and split them between BW (Hilbert, Hilda, Cheren, & Bianca) and BW2 (Nate, Rosa, Hugh, & Benga). Granted Benga never really showed interest in becoming Champion either, but his granpa was Champion so isn't farfetched, especially if we're including Bianca and Hugh.
Alola: It would be pairing people up with the Island Guardians. I don't think pairing them with their respective Kahuna would make sense if the Neo Champions are supposed to be the younger generation, in that case only Hapu would make sense (though I could be wrong, nothing says an adult could be a Neo Champion, and heck a Kahuna/Tapu pair makes sense). Outside of that, if they want to use the younger characters, they could go be Type? Sophocles/Koko, Mina/Lele, Mallow/Bulu, & Lana/Fini. Or they could try matching up a notable trainer connected to the island with their respective Tapu. That way they can have Hau/Koko and Hapu/Fini.

We'll leave Paldea alone for now.

 

[Mex]

Johto: I guess this could be a nice opportunity to give Ethan, Kris, and Lyra a special connecting theme which doesn't include Silver. Kris/Suicune would certainly be paired with Suicune, other two are a toss-up.
Alola: It would be pairing people up with the Island Guardians. I don't think pairing them with their respective Kahuna would make sense if the Neo Champions are supposed to be the younger generation, in that case only Hapu would make sense (though I could be wrong, nothing says an adult could be a Neo Champion, and heck a Kahuna/Tapu pair makes sense). Outside of that, if they want to use the younger characters, they could go be Type? Sophocles/Koko, Mina/Lele, Mallow/Bulu, & Lana/Fini. Or they could try matching up a notable trainer connected to the island with their respective Tapu. That way they can have Hau/Koko and Hapu/Fini.

You've pretty much just come up with what happened for the villain arc sygna suits with these.

Hau / Koko and Kris / Suicune are legitimately just combos already, though Hapu didn't get Fini, Mina did

For reference, Lana got Lele, Acerola Bulu, Ethan got Lugia and Lyra Celebi

 

[RocketSurgery]

Underwhelmed by the choice of kantrio, but also left unsure of what to pull, if anything. Blue + Zapdos feels unnecessary with last year's Pikaduo but otherwise sounds like a busted support, Red + Articuno is uninspired but guaranteed freeze and high dps special ice striker would be useful since there aren't many good ice units. On the other hand, my Johto roster is pretty thin, so might go for Lyra and Celebi's busted flinching.

I mean, I have enough to pity all of these if I wanted, but I'd rather only pull one or maybe two so that I have more than enough pities for Halloween.

Edit: I held off until I reached 5x pity and then pulled for Blue. Got him in like 4 pulls, so I tried my luck at Red and got him in 3 pulls. Since I was less than a pity in I went for Lyra and got her in a few pulls too. All in all I ended up with 3 Master fairs and only 5000 gems away from 4x pity. Not bad. (But by the law of averages this luck won't last). Now I can see what the Halloween mons will be before I decide on whether to pull for anything else.

 

[R_N]

Looks like the way they're being handled is Rei is the one who got isekai'd, and their going with the "amnesiac" options you can take during the game.

 

[Pikachu315111]

Looks like the way they're being handled is Rei is the one who got isekai'd, and their going with the "amnesiac" options you can take during the game.

So I guess this means the player character in L:A are just look-alikes afterall. Then again, I suppose it could also be possible they're different dimension counterparts. Where the Gen IV player went on to become Champion, in another dimension they didn't which Arceus took advantage of and sent that one back in time to fix things. And yes, I know in Masters it's Dawn who is a Sinnoh Champion and Lucas is the Professor's Assistant, doesn't make a difference and, if anything, furthers the difference dimension angle (one dimension Lucas becomes Champion, another Lucas is the Professor's Assistant, and in another he's named Rei and was sent back in time by Arceus to fix timespace).

 

[RocketSurgery]

I was wondering if DeNa would go with a cheeky Halloween tie-in and have Rei and Akari just be costumes for Lucas and Dawn to avoid the issue entirely (and only the Pokemon came through the distortion). I think that would have been funny, I guess they either weren't imaginative enough to think or it or did but weren't willing to deal with floods of in-game feedback complaining about the choice :P (or who knows, maybe TPC vetoed the idea).

The Halloween pairs have been datamined now, Phoebe with Cofagrigus and Roxanne with Runerigus (and maybe Lenora with Watchog is part of the story event, but it doesn't look like she's in costume). Hopefully I didn't use up all my luck on the anniversary master fairs and can get the two *igus pretty quick.

 

[Pikachu315111]

I was wondering if DeNa would go with a cheeky Halloween tie-in and have Rei and Akari just be costumes for Lucas and Dawn to avoid the issue entirely (and only the Pokemon came through the distortion). I think that would have been funny, I guess they either weren't imaginative enough to think or it or did but weren't willing to deal with floods of in-game feedback complaining about the choice :P (or who knows, maybe TPC vetoed the idea).

Maybe they didn't want to do that because Rei and Akari are characters in their own right. Yes they're look-alikes, but their roles (and questionably personalities) are different from Lucas & Dawn (especially here as they switched up which one would be the player character). Also, if they want to bring in the other Hisuian trainers, this is probably considered the "tamest" interaction. We don't know whether Rei & Akari are the ancestors of Lucas & Dawn, while they are drawn purposely to look like each other it could also be written off that they all look like a "generic kid". The more interesting interactions would obviously be with all the others. Mai & Maylene, Lian & Clay, Arezu & Mars, Sabi & Cheryl, Gaeric & Wulfric, Charm & Agatha & Bertha, Clover & Candice, Coin & Saturn, & Zisu & Flint. And this isn't counting the ones who have a counterpart you don't battle. Oh, and of course the trailer hints Rei and Akari are going to have an interesting interaction with Cynthia.

 

[bdt2002]

The more interesting interactions would obviously be with all the others. Mai & Maylene, Lian & Clay, Arezu & Mars, Sabi & Cheryl, Gaeric & Wulfric, Charm & Agatha & Bertha, Clover & Candice, Coin & Saturn, & Zisu & Flint. And this isn't counting the ones who have a counterpart you don't battle.

I haven’t played this game in quite some time, but now that the Scarlet & Violet DLC is out I feel confident enough that you could add Adaman & Perrin to that list too, provided the latter isn’t even in the game yet. If anything else this would give them an excuse to add Ursaluna into the game too.

As far as the discussions about Akari and Rei are concerned, I think what’s happening here is that there’s actually two separate Dawns and… Lucases? (How would one spell that?), one from the original DPPt versions of events and one for the Hisui version of events. I highly doubt TPC had the events of Legends planned out 16 years in advance after Gen 4 originally launched, meaning that in practice some kind of retcon must have happened with the Sinnoh storyline. Case in point, whether or not Dawn/Lucas was sent into the past created alternate timelines within the same reality.

 

[R_N]

iirc Rei/Akari are right handed, and meant to be a little older, while Lucas/Dawn are left handed

If not coincidental dopplegangers, clearly it's mirror universe they're pulled from