Shoddy Battle 2 (the future of Shoddy Battle)

[DougJustDoug]

However, Shoddy's display is often simply wrong, displaying effects that are actually on your opponent's field, or that are no longer in effect.

This is especially true of entry hazards.

In a recent upgrade to the Smogon server, I fixed many of the issues with Field Effects displaying incorrectly. It was incorrect for a very long time, so perhaps most users are not aware that I fixed it. But, if you look at it in battle on Smogon University, it should be much better now.

I'm not in the SourceForge repository atm, but it's possible that this change has not been checked in to the repository yet. That's my fault, and Colin has been pressing me to get the changes checked in. I normally would check in the fixes at the same time the code was deployed to the SU server, since we do not keep any Smogon server code "private", in accordance with the letter and spirit of the open-source license.

However, these changes were blended in with some the the code that was written in support of the Smogon April Fools joke with the fake anti-hax clause. One premise of the joke was that the hax clause was to be implemented with other server fixes (which was true). However, since the joke was revealed, I have not had a chance to pull out all the joke stuff and make a clean check-in of the real fixes to the code base. I will get the code checked in soon, for any other server admins out there that would like to get these improvements.

 

[Objection]

Also, there appears to be a 15-character limit for nicknames but I only found this out through trial and error. If feasible, could this be extended to 20 characters or something?

 

[Aether Nexus]

What are your biggest complaints with Shoddy Battle 1? Doesn't say what Hidden Power type you have. After closing out of it, it reverts back to your default team, which isn't helpful if you have multiple teams for different tiers.

Agreed on the Hidden Power bit. I would like to see that, because I sometimes forget what Hidden Power I'm using since I play team to team to team. I'd be great to see my HP type if I become forgetful as when I test out new teams I get pressured/nervous and I become forgetful. Maybe that's just me, but I agree with what auramaster says. Also about his second bit. It'd be cool if there was a way of having a drop down tier menu when picking one of your teams to load up. Can load one into Uber/Ou, etc so that way you can just load those, and test all your teams without swapping out each time. I'm sure it can be possible, or that I or other people out there are too lazy to do it ourselves and just load team after team.

Does the fact that the team files are now in XML mean that:

-We can use Pokesav Action Replay files as teams on Shoddy Battle? For example, if I made a team on Pokesav for my D/P/Pt game on my DS, would it be able to be used on Shoddy Battle as well since both the team files and Pokesav AR files are XML?
-Vice Versa. If I make a team on Shoddy BAttle which I wish to transfer to my DS, would I be able to put that XML file onto my AR Codelist for my Nintendo DS?

This seems like a great project, especially the double battles part. Kudos ;D.

Now, if it was an XML file, that'd be very neat. Also what G.E.C (too lazy to type your full name) mentions in this quote is something I'd like to see as well. As Smogon does not discuss or involve itself in the use of cheating/cheat codes, etc (but that's not the point) and that some users in Smogon (not stating everyone) may/do use legal hacks with such devices and programs. Wont say names, but you know what I'm talking about. The point of me ranting on about this quote is that, many users use such game altering programs in and out of Smogon, as we all know that not only Smogon members use the Smogon Shoddy Battle Sever and if they created a team it'd be pretty darn cool if it would be compatible to work with both SB2 and game altering programs.

With this in mind, let me state the problem with this G.E.C: The only problem I see in this is, in such programs it has more options to fill in, as when making a team on Shoddy, it's just basic things. You don't enter where you caught it, what it was caught in, so it may mess things up, unless SB2 adds such options, which I hardly doubt as that'd be very pointless to them.

Agreed on the Doube Battle part, also kudos to you Colin and Ben, (don't want to forget Ben lol). Many, many people out there are starting to/have been getting into Double Battles. I myself don't see the fascination of DB'ing but I guess you can be more creative and come up with fun combos in DB's. So testing them out on Shoddy first, and at the same time having unrated battles (will get to that quote after) with single/double battles would make SB2 a lot more fun for anyone.

Some users don't use SB1 because when you're new to SB and you add your 'awesome' Wi-Fi team to Shoddy, but gets annhiliated like there is no tomorrow, then you start to realize the players on SB1 are not joking around and are serious players. When I first made my account on Shoddy, and was always on the main server, and the teams I made got the pulp cremated out of them. I didn't quite understand my rating score, or anything like that. Thought you just made a team and played on the simulator to test out/have a fun competitive battle with an opponent, much like on NB. I admit, SB1 (and SB2) was not created for fun, mainly testing and what not, but with such additions, I'm sure more users would leave their DS's on their beds charging away rather doing the hard soon-to-be-appreciated work towards a new Wi-Fi team when they can just make a team on SB1/SB2 in a matter of minutes and play all day.

I would like to see a feature, similar to NetBattle's, where when a player gets disconnected, they have a certain amount of time to regain their connection and finish the battle. Everything else I would like to see has already been mentioned (chat that doesn't scroll down, unrated ladder, reset rating feature).

Yes, thank you K.G (sorry for shortening peoples name) as you wrote down what I've been wanting to be added onto SB1 for a long time. I as well as many other people around the Advance generation years got hooked onto NB and liked their simulator until Shoddy started getting some views and everyone slowly went there and NB just stopped updating. After so long, users like I switched to Shoddy with the rest of them.

Let me make this short, the reason I went to Shoddy, and to be very honest, I only went there to play because of so many players out there on Wi-Fi would play, how would you put it, unfairly? So the reason I fell in love with Sohddy was the reason of not being able to give your Pokemon a move it cannot learn, or anything to alter beyond game limitations.

This would be a really great improvement to SB2 if possible to add it, as I can't tell you how many times I lost to someone when my connection went haywire on me and I come back into the server with a lower rating when at times I was near to winning the matches I got disconnected on.

This is minor and shouldn't be a priority; but, if possible, it would be nice to be able to "reset" your ladder rating back to the default when you desired it too. As though you were starting a fresh account.

Thanks for hard work colin.

Agreed, thank you for stating this, Caelum. Having a way of "resetting" your ladder rating to a/the default would minimize the great percentage of users on Shoddy making multiple accounts to start with a new ladder rating score. I'm sure making multiplce accounts on Shoddy can/does increase the bandwidth? So just by having one account, be able to reset your rating and as Caelum says, starting "fresh" can be a great way of having less multiple accounts on SB2. Also, it's a great way of testing teams and not minding the drop as you can always reset it back to default after a week+/- of testing. This idea may get rid of the unrated battles because if you can just reset your rating, what'd would be the point of having battles that don't affect your rating score? Anyone else agree with that or is that just me? Anyways, moving on.

First of all, thanks for allowing us to state our likes, dislikes and wants.

I have a few suggestions:

• Two players playing an unrated battle should be allowed the option to play against each other willingly, and not just be provided a random opponent by the program, as currently happens in Shoddybattle1. This should aid testing teams against players willing to test with you.
• Related to the above, players currently create an alternate account to test teams with, and they tend to test their team on the ladder directly. However, the ladder should be a place where serious battles unfold and not tests. Because of this, a much more limited number of alternate accounts should be allowed for each player. I would actually support having no alternate accounts whatsoever except in most unusual cases; however, limiting them to 2 or 3 might be a better idea.
• EDIT: A 'Disallow Spectators' option as an extra option for a player's battle would be cherished by many players.

Agreed with X-Act with the unrated battles. Some users (like me at times) would just like to spend a few hours playing away on Shoddy with random fun teams and or to test out new teams without my rating to go down. With people worrying about their rating score going down, they, as X-Act mentions, make alternate accounts. Example: "Aether Nexus - Test" and so on. But what Caelum says, and already stated above this quote with his quote, it'd kind of be pointless to have the option to have unrated battles on SB2 but at the same time you have another option to reset your rating. So it's either one or the other I suppose when it comes down to it, or none at all.

As for what I'd like to be in it, I have no clue. I guess all the ideas I'd state... well, have already been stated. Beat me to the Bullet Punch. But until further ideas or suggestions come into mind, I'll be sure to include them if need be. I will say this though, and along with everyone else, thank you to Colin and Ben for all your hard work into doing all this. Keep up the good work.

Edit:

Please please add an ignore function. Some people are just massively annoying and sometimes there aren't mods around to ban them.

Since you're using irc style chat you were probably planning on having it anyway but I thought I'd ask just to be safe.

Okay, instead of making a new post to fill this up, I'll just edit my previous giant post with what these guys mentioned.

I agree very much for you to add such a thing to block certain annoying users on SB2. I think we all would love such a feature as that. We can go on the "Away" status to stop receiving random battle requests, but reading on and on about pointless things on the server and not being able to block such users can be a real pain in the Froslass. Kind of like on IRC's or chat sites, or even IM clients, you can right click on their name and "Block this user".

Here are some features I'd love to see:
-Disallow spectators like X-Act said

-Something similar to ctrl + f in terms of battles; in Shoddy Battle 1, when a person is in a battle, their name is italicized. It'd be nice if you could right click on the battling person's name and click "Watch Battle," or something. Whenever someone asks me to watch their battle (a tutee for example) or I want to watch a special tournament battle, I find it hard to find the battle in the long list of rapidly changing battles. Even if there was a ctrl +f for battlers it'd be nice.

Also, I sometimes forget when a Pokemon is asleep and I bring it out later. Having a Pokemon's status listed in the "Switch to..." screen would he helpful (I guess it will since you said you'll be able to inspect your Pokemon).

Let me help you on this one, Jimbo. I see what you're saying, and like most of the posts I quoted already, I agree. Lol. But, not something like a Ctrl + F feature, but something else more.. out of the Shoddy box. How about when you tick the "Show all battle notices" message on Shoddy, and you see on the screen it'll say "Aether Nexus vs. Jimbo" scroll by, and once you see that, you can doube click on the message, and it'll bring up the box of the battle/s. Woudln't that be a bit easier? The only problem to this is that if some users don't like the battle notices, then it puts the brakes on this idea.
~ Aether Nexus

 

[the_artic_one]

Please please add an ignore function. Some people are just massively annoying and sometimes there aren't mods around to ban them.

Since you're using irc style chat you were probably planning on having it anyway but I thought I'd ask just to be safe.

 

[Jimbo]

First of all I have to say this is absolutely fantastic, thank you guys for working on this!

Here are some features I'd love to see:
-Disallow spectators like X-Act said
-Something similar to ctrl + f in terms of battles; in Shoddy Battle 1, when a person is in a battle, their name is italicized. It'd be nice if you could right click on the battling person's name and click "Watch Battle," or something. Whenever someone asks me to watch their battle (a tutee for example) or I want to watch a special tournament battle, I find it hard to find the battle in the long list of rapidly changing battles. Even if there was a ctrl +f for battlers it'd be nice.
-A consistently working program would be awesome. I get the horrible "Unable to open application" message once a week or so, and re-downloading is a real bother. I assume this is something in Java that's fucking up so it shouldn't be a problem with SB2.

Again, thank you to the programmers!!

oh edit another suggestion:

I find myself frequently missing things like additonal effects from attacks (Pokemon X used Thunderbolt! Pokemon Y was paralyzed). Maybe if the messages could scroll a little slower, or they could be written in a few different colors (or bolded), it'd be easier to see. Also, I sometimes forget when a Pokemon is asleep and I bring it out later. Having a Pokemon's status listed in the "Switch to..." screen would he helpful (I guess it will since you said you'll be able to inspect your Pokemon).

 

[TheFourthChaser]

Again, not available information in-game. You should know what Hidden Power your own Pokemon has anyway, and it's your own fault if you forget.

Thats not true, you can check it in Platnium. There is a man in Veilstone City where he will tell you the Hidden Power of any pokemon you have. As for what I think should be in Shoddy Battle 2 I like Kevin Garret's idea of being able to get back to a battle if you have been disconnected.

 

[Tanner]

I find myself frequently missing things like additonal effects from attacks (Pokemon X used Thunderbolt! Pokemon Y was paralyzed). Maybe if the messages could scroll a little slower, or they could be written in a few different colors (or bolded), it'd be easier to see. Also, I sometimes forget when a Pokemon is asleep and I bring it out later. Having a Pokemon's status listed in the "Switch to..." screen would he helpful (I guess it will since you said you'll be able to inspect your Pokemon).

I second this, I think it'd make the program a lot more user friendly in general if text either scrolled more slowly or bolded/colored events like Misses, Crits, status effects.

 

[Lemmiwinks MkII]

Thats not true, you can check it in Platnium. There is a man in Veilstone City where he will tell you the Hidden Power of any pokemon you have. As for what I think should be in Shoddy Battle 2 I like Kevin Garret's idea of being able to get back to a battle if you have been disconnected.

By in-game I meant during a battle, sorry if my wording confused you. Shoddy isn't concerned with what can be done outside link battles. The man telling you at Veilstone City is analogous to inspecting your team on Team Editor before logging in.

I also agree with the disconnection suggestion, as well as the option of disallowing spectators.

EDIT: the color coding of certain key events such as status infliction also sounds good to me. It would help somewhat with getting around the lack of animation to display significant events more distinctively. The PAR, PSN, BRN symbols next to the Pokemon's name, just like in link battles, would also be ideal.

 

[gec]

With this in mind, let me state the problem with this G.E.C: The only problem I see in this is, in such programs it has more options to fill in, as when making a team on Shoddy, it's just basic things. You don't enter where you caught it, what it was caught in, so it may mess things up, unless SB2 adds such options, which I hardly doubt as that'd be very pointless to them.

Firstly, thanks for the reply (: Also, the part about the additional options (such as location met/hatching details) doesn't need to be included in SB2. I'd be fine if just the Species/Nature/Moves/IVs/EVs got transferred to Pokesav, I wouldn't mind having to fill out the other details myself.

 

[matty]

1) Could we add a Mute/Ignore Button like the artic one suggested?
2) I also like the idea of disallowing people from watching battles.
3) Double clicking on people's name(s) in the battle screen to watch a battle would be nice

 

[Fuzznip]

What I'd Like to See:

When you're battling and you want to switch, there's an option that could allow you to see your Pokemon's moveset.

A lower "Timed Battle". 5 minutes is just too long, and it's frustrating when you wait for 3-4 minutes and your opponent says "Sorry I'm back" and then you start the battle. It's even worse when you end up losing. Can it be reduced to 3 minutes perhaps? And if that's too short, you could always add more time when they select a move, such as +30 seconds to give the battlers time.

If there's a way to implement Pokemon battle music from the older games, and newer ones such as the music that plays when you face Giratina. It would be awesome for really intense battles, and it makes Shoddy more lively.

In the battle log, would it be possible to make the font of the opponents side in a different colour than all black? It will be easier to read and see what's happening. Also, divide each turn with a thicker, darker line so you know that you're not looking at the wrong thing.

When someone talks when you're in a battle, the chat automatically drops down to the previous post. If possible, maybe you could remove that function so whenever someone talks, the battle log doesn't go straight down. This also goes for the chat log to. It's just really annoying when you're trying to count PP of a certain move or when you are writing down something someone said while people are typing non-stop.

 

[Fishin]

I only have one suggestion.

It is not Pokemon related.

If it fits in with your planned way to handle challenging people...bring back the Netbattle-style user info windows!

Seconding this, it would add a lot of personality to the whole Shoddy experience.

Private battles are also something that would be nice for tournaments and such.

Other than that, not much to say. The listed changes sound great, and thanks for all the hard work.

 

[Unownasofyet]

Issues I have with Shoddy:

1. The time limit should be 5 minutes with a 5 second increment, with options to play 1 minute and 10 minute battles, as well as being able to play without increments, like in blitz chess.
2. People should have profiles in addition to their screen name. It would show their current rating as well.
3. Censor or at least give an option to turn off chat windows. It is annoying to see never ending stream of swearing when someone else enters the room.
4. Give the option to broadcast battle tutorials, as well as repeats of good warstories. Also list the highest rated battles first so people could go straight to the good battles.

Now I don't want this to be Internet Chess Club 2.0, but designing formats based on their servers would make everything look amazing. I hope we some great stuff!

 

[kd24]

this is awesome guys.


even though its only a fanasty, it would be amazing imo if you could "record battles" on shoddy and then shoddy would give a "battle code". then players would just put in the battle-code to rewatch great matches. sounds like a sci-fi movie i know, but this would be just amazing and it would help chronicle the metagame more.


but anyway, great job, and i cant wait for triple battles

 

[Carloscvx]

I would like the option to ignore people in the chat.

Oh, and also, it would be way more helpful to build teams if the pokemon are listed in alphabetical order instead of numerical order on the team builder.

 

[Mario With Lasers]

Also, there appears to be a 15-character limit for nicknames but I only found this out through trial and error. If feasible, could this be extended to 20 characters or something?

The in-game limit is 10 and you want to increase it even further?

What I'd Like to See:

When you're battling and you want to switch, there's an option that could allow you to see your Pokemon's moveset.

A lower "Timed Battle". 5 minutes is just too long, and it's frustrating when you wait for 3-4 minutes and your opponent says "Sorry I'm back" and then you start the battle. It's even worse when you end up losing. Can it be reduced to 3 minutes perhaps? And if that's too short, you could always add more time when they select a move, such as +30 seconds to give the battlers time.

And there're those times when you take too much to make a move and then the timer doesn't reset the next turn, so you have only 1 minute or less to make a move. And it never resets back to 5 minutes.

If there's a way to implement Pokemon battle music from the older games, and newer ones such as the music that plays when you face Giratina. It would be awesome for really intense battles, and it makes Shoddy more lively.

Hmm, that's an interesting option, but couldn't you just use Winamp or something else?

In the battle log, would it be possible to make the font of the opponents side in a different colour than all black? It will be easier to read and see what's happening. Also, divide each turn with a thicker, darker line so you know that you're not looking at the wrong thing.

I agree with this. Darker lines separating turns, different colors for status afflictions and bold message when someone scores a CH (I think Netbattle has it, am I right?) would be nice.

Seconding this, it would add a lot of personality to the whole Shoddy experience.

[*]People should have profiles in addition to their screen name. It would show their current rating as well.

Thirding Surgo's idea, and also Unown's suggestion is great.


And I'd love if Shoddy 2 could memorize the folder where the currently loaded team is. I had to move all my teams to Desktop so I could access then without getting through my HD every damn time.

 

[Syberia]

This is minor and shouldn't be a priority; but, if possible, it would be nice to be able to "reset" your ladder rating back to the default when you desired it too. As though you were starting a fresh account.

This would reduce the need for so many alternate accounts.

Is this on the cartridges? Because I don't recall it being, and we shouldn't add more stuff that isn't possible in link battles IMO.

It's an issue of convenience. You can't see your opponent's health percentage or undo a move choice in the cartridges either, I suppose you want to remove those features as well?

It is possible to know how many stat boosts a pokemon has in battle; you count them. It's easier to count stat boosts than it is to breed for perfect IVs, yet Shoddy conveniently allows us to do the latter. Therefore, there's no reason it can't tell us how many stat boosts something has.

I also wish it would keep the whole log scrollable in the battle window. It currently cuts off and you can't tell what happened previously.

 

[Hocotate]

Two minor things for convenience:
1. I don't know how many people actually use the box function, but it's a great time saver. With that in mind, could there be separate tabs for different tiers in Shoddy 2? I separate Pokemon into boxes based on their roles, and an UU Rapid Spinner probably wouldn't fit in Ubers. I suppose we could just add 'UU' or 'Ubers' or whatever in front of these boxes, but it would get cluttered fast.
2. Would it be possible to add a feature to choose a Pokemon simply by typing its name? I wouldn't mind having to spell it correctly, but having to pick from the drop-down list can be tedious even if we know the generation. EDIT: Or use the 'alphabetical order' suggestion, that's much easier :P

Also seconding others' thanks for all the work on this.

 

[dbolt]

2. Would it be possible to add a feature to choose a Pokemon simply by typing its name? I wouldn't mind having to spell it correctly, but having to pick from the drop-down list can be tedious even if we know the generation.

You can already do this by typing the pokemon's name on the list.

 

[Aether Nexus]

this is awesome guys.


even though its only a fanasty, it would be amazing imo if you could "record battles" on shoddy and then shoddy would give a "battle code". then players would just put in the battle-code to rewatch great matches. sounds like a sci-fi movie i know, but this would be just amazing and it would help chronicle the metagame more.


but anyway, great job, and i cant wait for triple battles

Lol Going a bit sci-fi here, but nonetheless I think it's a good idea, but it'd be too much work for Colin and Ben to add this type of feature. Well, I can't speak for either of them, but I would believe it'd be none of their concern to add a featuer such as this. It'd be interesting though, kind of like a built in recorder, somewhat like how VGA does it (sorry if I'm not suppose to mention emulator talk. >_>).

The reason for this, I highly doubt it'd be added, as you can just download some simple comp screen recording program and record your Shoddy battles like all the kids on Youtube do. Don't need to see anymore Shoddy battles flying all over Youtube with this feature added on to SB2.

But best of all that I really would vote for to be added to SB2 above all other selection would be the stuff I wrote under the quote of Unownasofyet.

~ Aether Nexus

 

[Adam Blade]

I'm about to explode over this, already. To be honest, I don't have any ideas for suggestions. I might edit them in later...

 

[StatigarJames]

Ah! Shoddybattle 2. I was wondering when this would come into place. Well done Colin!

Well, Numbah and I just gave up with the battleclient after hearing about this.

 

[Lemmiwinks MkII]

It's an issue of convenience. You can't see your opponent's health percentage or undo a move choice in the cartridges either, I suppose you want to remove those features as well?

I would be in favor of changing the opponent's health bar to the way it is on the cartridges, because currently Shoddy gives you more information than you're meant to be entitled to. The 'Undo move' function is an interface issue and should be treated as such. Not that I agree with it as it stands though, I'd personally prefer a system where you're given about 3-5 seconds to 'Confirm or Cancel' a selected instruction, thus accounting for occasional mouse misclicks. It is very inconsistent the way this feature currently works as you can only undo a move whilst your opponent is still deciding, and you get all the time until then to undo. I don't agree with either.

It is possible to know how many stat boosts a pokemon has in battle; you count them. It's easier to count stat boosts than it is to breed for perfect IVs, yet Shoddy conveniently allows us to do the latter. Therefore, there's no reason it can't tell us how many stat boosts something has.

Wrong. IV breeding is performed prior to a battle, therefore there is nothing wrong with Shoddy making this more convenient. Adding a stat boost counter would be adding an in-battle function that doesn't exist. The two issues are not comparable at all. If you want to count stat boosts then you count the stat boosts through your PP, just like you would on Wi-Fi. Shoddy also gives you the log to count these sorts of things, why the pressing need for even more help? In fact, I'm surprised you didn't bring up the battle log issue, as that is possbly the biggest source of easy reference that you don't get on the cartridges. It should technically only show up the previous turn on screen at any given time, possibly for a limited time after the previous turn.

 

[bearzly]

First of all, thanks for allowing us to state our likes, dislikes and wants.

I have a few suggestions:

• Two players playing an unrated battle should be allowed the option to play against each other willingly, and not just be provided a random opponent by the program, as currently happens in Shoddybattle1. This should aid testing teams against players willing to test with you. We are planning on keeping the old system where you can challenge anyone, but also adding an unrated matchmaking system to let people find battles with enforced rules e.g. for testing purposes
• Related to the above, players currently create an alternate account to test teams with, and they tend to test their team on the ladder directly. However, the ladder should be a place where serious battles unfold and not tests. Because of this, a much more limited number of alternate accounts should be allowed for each player. I would actually support having no alternate accounts whatsoever except in most unusual cases; however, limiting them to 2 or 3 might be a better idea. I'm not exactly sure about this one, although it makes some sense
• The Conservative Rating Estimate to rank players on the ladder should be changed to a better one, for instance to this one. Colin will handle this, but he did throw his support behind it in that topic so I don't see why not
• EDIT: A 'Disallow Spectators' option as an extra option for a player's battle would be cherished by many players. Users will have a lot more abilities for ignoring other players, including restricting them from joining battles

What features would you like to see in Shoddy Battle 2? A little cup ladder. The ability to find a match unrated.

As someone pointed out, little cup is already possible. I'll have to talk with Colin, but maybe ladders will also be specified through XML and javascript so that no compiling is needed to change the ladders. Also, your first point is addressed in the initial post; there is an unrated matchmaking system planned which will let you play with ladder rules

What are your biggest complaints with Shoddy Battle 1? Doesn't say what Hidden Power type you have. After closing out of it, it reverts back to your default team, which isn't helpful if you have multiple teams for different tiers.

The thought about Hidden Power is good, I'll be sure to add that to the new battle window. About the way team loading is done, I have some thoughts about changing it (see further down)

What did you like most about Shoddy Battle 1 and would like to remain in Shoddy Battle 2? The unrated option.

As I mentioned above, the ability to challenge anyone will not be gone.

As far as team builder interface goes, I would enjoy if the typable EVs / IVs remained intact in Shoddybattle 2 (as opposed to the horrible slide bar that Netbattle employs).

In fact, I pretty much adore the entire team builder that is currently being used, with the exception of the move list. The ability to type in a move manually would be much appreciated (this is stolen from Netbattle's team builder).

Thus far, the design of the team builder has remained mostly unchanged. I'll look into how to make the move list a bit more friendly.

Also, not sure how hard this would be to do, but a damage calculator built into the program would be really nice for those of us who currently have to use multiple windows to do quick in battle damage calculations.

If I am able to, I plan on having a fancy damage calculator that will not only let you pick arbitrary pokemon, but also import from your current battle and boxes

I would also like an "ignore user" feature. This is going to be implemented as part of the IRC style chat

An "unrated ladder" would be nice. It would also cut down on the number of alternate accounts created because you could do all of your testing and competitive laddering on the same account, rather than having to create an alt to preserve your ladder rating. Already planned as mentioned above

After canceling an attempt to find a match on the ladder, it actually unloads your team to where you have to re-open a team to find another match. I'd like if this was removed in shoddybattle 2. The way that loading teams is handled may be changed, but if not then this will be fixed

I know there's more I want, but I can't think of it right now.

Does the fact that the team files are now in XML mean that:

-We can use Pokesav Action Replay files as teams on Shoddy Battle? For example, if I made a team on Pokesav for my D/P/Pt game on my DS, would it be able to be used on Shoddy Battle as well since both the team files and Pokesav AR files are XML?
-Vice Versa. If I make a team on Shoddy BAttle which I wish to transfer to my DS, would I be able to put that XML file onto my AR Codelist for my Nintendo DS? I've never used a Pokesav before, but it sounds like an interesting idea. If you can, PM an example of a team file and I'll see what can be done

This seems like a great project, especially the double battles part. Kudos ;D.

There should be an unrated pool like social in Halo games. This would be really great for testing and would reduce the amount of accounts needed which has really gotten out of hand. Addressed above. I also am a Halo player and agree that the unrated matchmaking is very nice to have

I think there should be a strong ban system too. Where people who consitently break the rules will get banned for good. This ban would not be bypassed by a variable ip. In order to help this there would be a Bot who would pick up on things said and you would recieve infractions for say flaming or talking in another language. It doesn't seem feasible to write a bot that would fairly detect those sorts of things, and it is up to the server operator anyways. "SID" bans will never be happening, so IP ban is the strongest it will get unfortunately.

Many good suggestions have already been made and i really look forward to Shoddy Battle 2.

BTW. WHy is it called Shoddy Battle? It was a bit of a historical joke, but as we were thinking of a project name, we just decided to stick with it.

I would like to suggest the reworking of Freeze and Sleep clauses. They are currently enforced in an incorrect state, such that they alter game mechanics. Can they be implemented in such a way that if you use a sleep move again, you lose, or however it was meant to be? There is a plan to have both traditional and new clause mechanics available to give users the freedom to choose how they would like to play

A few things I think would be welcome improvements.

I've noticed that Shoddy does not seems to display field effects correctly. If you hover your cursor over your pokemon, it should display all the current things affecting your side of the field, such as Light Screen or Spikes. However, Shoddy's display is often simply wrong, displaying effects that are actually on your opponent's field, or that are no longer in effect. The way that things like spikes and lightscreen were done in Shoddy Battle 1 was pretty shoddy. We're planning on fixing it to correctly display effects on each user, each party, and the field

Going along with the above, their should be some way to check current stat levels of pokemon on the field. After a drawn-out CM stalling session, I'd really like to know whether I'm at +5 or +6 before I click CM again. Addressed in the OP, this will be there

There should be a way to see your pokemon's moveset even if it is not currently out. This is important in random battles, but can also help if you've been running similar teams, and aren't sure what one you currently have. Also addressed in the OP, will be there

Speaking of random battles, if you have certain clauses checked, such as the item or evasion clauses, the teams should be generated to conform to those clauses. This could most likely be done

Your own Pokemon's HP should always be displayed in whole numbers. Having 25% HP left doesn't tell you whether your Salamence can switch into SR one last time. Having 84/331 HP does. Since you would have this information in cartridge play, there's no reason not to include it. The way that health is displayed is being reworked a bit

Lastly, it would be nice if your Hidden Power's type and power are displayed. It's unbelieveably annoying, for example, to discover your Blaziken has HP Electric and not Grass when you try to KO your opponent's Gastrodon. Addressed above

I only have one suggestion.

It is not Pokemon related.

If it fits in with your planned way to handle challenging people...bring back the Netbattle-style user info windows!

I mean, where would Smogon be without that great "Archive of Humorous NetBattle User Info Screenshots" thread?

I've been thinking about this idea a bit. Those messages were useful for seeing what kind of battle people are looking for, and were often pretty amusing. One of the other ideas I had was to let the server define tier lists, and then when you viewed a user's information you could see what tier their team was. You're right though that the windows brought more personality to the experience, and were often very funny to read, so maybe they can be brought back.

First of all I have to thank you for still working on Shoddy Battle and not saying "It's finished, let's do something else." Me and Colin didn't want to stop working on it if it wasn't done right, so here we are

This would be amazing, because sometimes there are disconnects for about 40 seconds and you don't have any chances to continue the battle... I'm not sure if this will be feasible or not...Colin will have to be the final word

Another feature would be a + beside the fields for the EVs, because there are so much Pokemon which just need a simple 4/252/252 split.
If you press the +, the EV points simply get 252 or the EVs left over. Along with keeping the team builder mostly intact, I'm also planning on adding some more convenience features, especially for EVs. Your idea is a pretty good one.

Also, there appears to be a 15-character limit for nicknames but I only found this out through trial and error. If feasible, could this be extended to 20 characters or something? I believe Colin already raised the limit to 19 or 20

Agreed on the Hidden Power bit. I would like to see that, because I sometimes forget what Hidden Power I'm using since I play team to team to team. I'd be great to see my HP type if I become forgetful as when I test out new teams I get pressured/nervous and I become forgetful. Maybe that's just me, but I agree with what auramaster says. Also about his second bit. It'd be cool if there was a way of having a drop down tier menu when picking one of your teams to load up. Can load one into Uber/Ou, etc so that way you can just load those, and test all your teams without swapping out each time. I'm sure it can be possible, or that I or other people out there are too lazy to do it ourselves and just load team after team. Being able to specify teams for the different ladders is a good idea, and will likely be done unless something else about the team loading system changes


Now, if it was an XML file, that'd be very neat. Also what G.E.C (too lazy to type your full name) mentions in this quote is something I'd like to see as well. As Smogon does not discuss or involve itself in the use of cheating/cheat codes, etc (but that's not the point) and that some users in Smogon (not stating everyone) may/do use legal hacks with such devices and programs. Wont say names, but you know what I'm talking about. The point of me ranting on about this quote is that, many users use such game altering programs in and out of Smogon, as we all know that not only Smogon members use the Smogon Shoddy Battle Sever and if they created a team it'd be pretty darn cool if it would be compatible to work with both SB2 and game altering programs.

With this in mind, let me state the problem with this G.E.C: The only problem I see in this is, in such programs it has more options to fill in, as when making a team on Shoddy, it's just basic things. You don't enter where you caught it, what it was caught in, so it may mess things up, unless SB2 adds such options, which I hardly doubt as that'd be very pointless to them.

I'll have to look into it a bit more, but any unnecessary fields could be easily ignored

Agreed on the Doube Battle part, also kudos to you Colin and Ben, (don't want to forget Ben lol). Many, many people out there are starting to/have been getting into Double Battles. I myself don't see the fascination of DB'ing but I guess you can be more creative and come up with fun combos in DB's. So testing them out on Shoddy first, and at the same time having unrated battles (will get to that quote after) with single/double battles would make SB2 a lot more fun for anyone.

Some users don't use SB1 because when you're new to SB and you add your 'awesome' Wi-Fi team to Shoddy, but gets annhiliated like there is no tomorrow, then you start to realize the players on SB1 are not joking around and are serious players. When I first made my account on Shoddy, and was always on the main server, and the teams I made got the pulp cremated out of them. I didn't quite understand my rating score, or anything like that. Thought you just made a team and played on the simulator to test out/have a fun competitive battle with an opponent, much like on NB. I admit, SB1 (and SB2) was not created for fun, mainly testing and what not, but with such additions, I'm sure more users would leave their DS's on their beds charging away rather doing the hard soon-to-be-appreciated work towards a new Wi-Fi team when they can just make a team on SB1/SB2 in a matter of minutes and play all day.

Thanks for the support. We will also (hopefully) have the ability to see your rank instead of just your CRE, which will give you a more tangible feel for your rating

Agreed with X-Act with the unrated battles. Some users (like me at times) would just like to spend a few hours playing away on Shoddy with random fun teams and or to test out new teams without my rating to go down. With people worrying about their rating score going down, they, as X-Act mentions, make alternate accounts. Example: "Aether Nexus - Test" and so on. But what Caelum says, and already stated above this quote with his quote, it'd kind of be pointless to have the option to have unrated battles on SB2 but at the same time you have another option to reset your rating. So it's either one or the other I suppose when it comes down to it, or none at all. I've played many online games and never had the choice to reset my rating. The ability to reset your rating takes away from the competitive atmosphere, since you know that if you lose you can just reset your rating and go again. It sounds like a bad idea to me.

I agree very much for you to add such a thing to block certain annoying users on SB2. I think we all would love such a feature as that. We can go on the "Away" status to stop receiving random battle requests, but reading on and on about pointless things on the server and not being able to block such users can be a real pain in the Froslass. Kind of like on IRC's or chat sites, or even IM clients, you can right click on their name and "Block this user". There will be options to ignore users. Also, you will be able to be "not accepting challenges" while not marking yourself as away.

Let me help you on this one, Jimbo. I see what you're saying, and like most of the posts I quoted already, I agree. Lol. But, not something like a Ctrl + F feature, but something else more.. out of the Shoddy box. How about when you tick the "Show all battle notices" message on Shoddy, and you see on the screen it'll say "Aether Nexus vs. Jimbo" scroll by, and once you see that, you can doube click on the message, and it'll bring up the box of the battle/s. Woudln't that be a bit easier? The only problem to this is that if some users don't like the battle notices, then it puts the brakes on this idea. My plan is to have the right click menu on a user to show a list Watch battle vs x, Watch battle vs y etc.
~ Aether Nexus

First of all I have to say this is absolutely fantastic, thank you guys for working on this!

Here are some features I'd love to see:
-Disallow spectators like X-Act said
-Something similar to ctrl + f in terms of battles; in Shoddy Battle 1, when a person is in a battle, their name is italicized. It'd be nice if you could right click on the battling person's name and click "Watch Battle," or something. Whenever someone asks me to watch their battle (a tutee for example) or I want to watch a special tournament battle, I find it hard to find the battle in the long list of rapidly changing battles. Even if there was a ctrl +f for battlers it'd be nice.
-A consistently working program would be awesome. I get the horrible "Unable to open application" message once a week or so, and re-downloading is a real bother. I assume this is something in Java that's fucking up so it shouldn't be a problem with SB2.

I'm not sure if these posts are out of order, but anyways I addressed the battle thing one up. About the last note, we are still going to be using Java for the client. We looked at a lot of alternatives but nothing had a nice GUI builder like the one for Java, and one that let us develop for all platforms easily. We are trying hard to solve these mysterious errors that people get when trying to run the program though

Again, thank you to the programmers!!

oh edit another suggestion:

I find myself frequently missing things like additonal effects from attacks (Pokemon X used Thunderbolt! Pokemon Y was paralyzed). Maybe if the messages could scroll a little slower, or they could be written in a few different colors (or bolded), it'd be easier to see. Also, I sometimes forget when a Pokemon is asleep and I bring it out later. Having a Pokemon's status listed in the "Switch to..." screen would he helpful (I guess it will since you said you'll be able to inspect your Pokemon).A feature that Colin failed to mention was that everything about the chat will be able to be styled (using css). This will let you customise the way that battle messages are shown, among many other things

I second this, I think it'd make the program a lot more user friendly in general if text either scrolled more slowly or bolded/colored events like Misses, Crits, status effects.Second one addressed one up. For the first one, I was hoping to have a small optional delay between messages. Colin was opposed to this idea, but maybe he will change his mind.

1) Could we add a Mute/Ignore Button like the artic one suggested?
2) I also like the idea of disallowing people from watching battles.
3) Double clicking on people's name(s) in the battle screen to watch a battle would be nice
These have both been addressed above

What I'd Like to See:

When you're battling and you want to switch, there's an option that could allow you to see your Pokemon's moveset. Addressed in OP

A lower "Timed Battle". 5 minutes is just too long, and it's frustrating when you wait for 3-4 minutes and your opponent says "Sorry I'm back" and then you start the battle. It's even worse when you end up losing. Can it be reduced to 3 minutes perhaps? And if that's too short, you could always add more time when they select a move, such as +30 seconds to give the battlers time. Also addressed in OP. Will be fully customisable

If there's a way to implement Pokemon battle music from the older games, and newer ones such as the music that plays when you face Giratina. It would be awesome for really intense battles, and it makes Shoddy more lively. Ehhh doubtful. Play the music through iTunes if you want if need it.

In the battle log, would it be possible to make the font of the opponents side in a different colour than all black? It will be easier to read and see what's happening. Also, divide each turn with a thicker, darker line so you know that you're not looking at the wrong thing. Addressed a couple up, the chat screens will be styleable

When someone talks when you're in a battle, the chat automatically drops down to the previous post. If possible, maybe you could remove that function so whenever someone talks, the battle log doesn't go straight down. This also goes for the chat log to. It's just really annoying when you're trying to count PP of a certain move or when you are writing down something someone said while people are typing non-stop.Addressed in OP

Issues I have with Shoddy:

1. The time limit should be 5 minutes with a 5 second increment, with options to play 1 minute and 10 minute battles, as well as being able to play without increments, like in blitz chess. Addressed in OP and a bit up
2. People should have profiles in addition to their screen name. It would show their current rating as well. Could be useful
3. Censor or at least give an option to turn off chat windows. It is annoying to see never ending stream of swearing when someone else enters the room. Addressed above
4. Give the option to broadcast battle tutorials, as well as repeats of good warstories. Also list the highest rated battles first so people could go straight to the good battles.

Now I don't want this to be Internet Chess Club 2.0, but designing formats based on their servers would make everything look amazing. I hope we some great stuff!One thing that is planned is to be able to view the current battle sorted by amount of spectators and maybe other criteria

this is awesome guys.


even though its only a fanasty, it would be amazing imo if you could "record battles" on shoddy and then shoddy would give a "battle code". then players would just put in the battle-code to rewatch great matches. sounds like a sci-fi movie i know, but this would be just amazing and it would help chronicle the metagame more. It may be possible to store the server messages and then replay the battle later. As for a "battle code", doubtful, it's more likely that you would have to send a file

but anyway, great job, and i cant wait for triple battles

I would like the option to ignore people in the chat.

Oh, and also, it would be way more helpful to build teams if the pokemon are listed in alphabetical order instead of numerical order on the team builder. Maybe that can be an option, but you can just type while in the list to jump to that species

This would reduce the need for so many alternate accounts.
...
I also wish it would keep the whole log scrollable in the battle window. It currently cuts off and you can't tell what happened previously. There is a bug that caused the client to crash if there are too many lines in a chat log. Unfortunately, this is party of Java. Doug recently brought this to our attention, and we are looking for a fix.

Two minor things for convenience:
1. I don't know how many people actually use the box function, but it's a great time saver. With that in mind, could there be separate tabs for different tiers in Shoddy 2? I separate Pokemon into boxes based on their roles, and an UU Rapid Spinner probably wouldn't fit in Ubers. I suppose we could just add 'UU' or 'Ubers' or whatever in front of these boxes, but it would get cluttered fast. I'm planning on extending the box functionality to be a bit more useful
2. Would it be possible to add a feature to choose a Pokemon simply by typing its name? I wouldn't mind having to spell it correctly, but having to pick from the drop-down list can be tedious even if we know the generation. EDIT: Or use the 'alphabetical order' suggestion, that's much easier :P Addressed above

Also seconding others' thanks for all the work on this.

I would be in favor of changing the opponent's health bar to the way it is on the cartridges, because currently Shoddy gives you more information than you're meant to be entitled to. The 'Undo move' function is an interface issue and should be treated as such. Not that I agree with it as it stands though, I'd personally prefer a system where you're given about 3-5 seconds to 'Confirm or Cancel' a selected instruction, thus accounting for occasional mouse misclicks. It is very inconsistent the way this feature currently works as you can only undo a move whilst your opponent is still deciding, and you get all the time until then to undo. I don't agree with either.

We are going to be changing the way that health is displayed, i.e. in the challenge window you will have the ability to specify how the server should send health e.g. percent, full information, fourty-eighths. Also the cancel button will now be a client side feature rather than server side, eradicating some of the issues

Wrong. IV breeding is performed prior to a battle, therefore there is nothing wrong with Shoddy making this more convenient. Adding a stat boost counter would be adding an in-battle function that doesn't exist. The two issues are not comparable at all. If you want to count stat boosts then you count the stat boosts through your PP, just like you would on Wi-Fi. Shoddy also gives you the log to count these sorts of things, why the pressing need for even more help? In fact, I'm surprised you didn't bring up the battle log issue, as that is possbly the biggest source of easy reference that you don't get on the cartridges. It should technically only show up the previous turn on screen at any given time, possibly for a limited time after the previous turn. The stat ups are just there for convenience, rather than to make you keep count. It shouldn't be a very hostile issue, as you aren't getting any more information that you could obtain yourself.

Sorry if I skipped one of your points or posts. There was a lot to go through and I saved time by ignoring some that were duplicates of other posts. Keep posting your suggestions though, that's what will make this a much better piece of software!

 

[lilyhollow]

Adding a stat boost counter would be adding an in-battle function that doesn't exist.

this doesn't matter, the impact is nonexistant except for sheer convenience so to base our decision based solely on whether it can be emulated with a cartridge is absurd. this is in no way comparable to displaying damage in exact percentages; I'd liken it more to giving moves their full in-game animations just so the battles last the same amount of time-- why? There's no reason for things like that to happen, as the game itself is unchanged from every perspective, practical or theoretical, to any player given sufficient time and patience, neither of which are relevant skills to this game in the first place (in other words, sure, if in-game DPPt gave you a time limit, then increasing convenience would have a meaningful impact that would be undesirable to anyone wishing to simulate 4th gen wifi play).

I support any addition that increases convenience without impacting other aspects of the game itself. For example, I'd enjoy having the opponent's revealed Pokemon displayed or listed on-screen so I don't need to write them down mid-battle... the game is nothing if not benefited by removing these kinds of artificial barriers. In fact, I'd love for things like used attacks and activated items to be automatically listed as well, though that's perhaps an "in a perfect world" sort of suggestion.