Sword & Shield **Official news only** DLC Crown Tundra 22nd October

Pikachu315111

Ranting & Raving!
is a Community Contributoris a Top Smogon Media Contributor
I personally think contests are a fun concept, so I would appreciate them coming back if that's the case
And it would easily fit with Galar's theme of making the Pokemon League a heavily advertised televised event. Not everyone may be into the battling and Contests provide a just as entertaining alternative letting people see Pokemon just use their moves. I still say they could add Pokemon Musicals into the mix as a "dancing round" though with high tight they are on a schedule probably skip out on it (I guess we'd have to wait till the Gen V remakes for that).

Also another reason it makes sense to bring back Contests is if the Sinnoh remakes are this gen they can get a leg up on it.

As someone who likes to grind and test out stuff on the post-game battle facilities, I'm interested to see how [REDACTED] affects the sets in there. Most of the time once you get to a certain point in these things you start seeing trainers using minor legendaries ie the regis, the genies, Cresselia and such, which to me always came off as a really lazy and nonsensical way to boost difficulty. I seem to recall that in BW1's Battle Subway, most of the basic levels were composed of NFEs and other similarly weak shitmons, only going to two-stagers like Beartic near the latter half of the challenge as well as making you wait until the Super Subways to start facing stuff like third-stage mons.
And not just [REDACTED] will affect it. The removals of Mega Evolutions and Z-Moves pretty much means many of the sets from Gen VII's Battle Tree can't be re-used. And of course the Battle Facility of Gen VIII will allow for Dynamax/Gigantamax. Infact I can see them maybe splitting battle formats between normal Single and Double battles and Dynamax Single and Double battles.
 
The regular mode is easy no matter the game and is designed to be beatable with random stuff from one's in-game team. The Battle Tree just makes it easy by having lots of bad movesets rather than NFEs (plus allowing you to use overleveled Pokemon/cover legendaries).

As someone currently playing through the Subway again, I can say the Super mode doesn't have much of a boost in difficulty other than the usual pattern of the IVs getting better; from the outset, you face Pokemon/movesets that only the toughest trainers in the Tree would use. Legendaries also appear earlier than they do in the Tree, but difficulty-wise that's not too relevant since whether something is 'legendary' (much like 2nd/3rd stage) doesn't have much bearing on how difficult it is to face.
I agree! Though, I would add that even with an ideal movepool and item, battles would still not be much of a real challenge for competitive players. If GF were to improve the AI dramatically, that would be a nice change. They already did so, albeit to some degree, with totem battles. One can only hope that this trend will be continued.
On another note, it would be interesting to see how a limited dex and the removal of z-moves and mega-evolution will affect our battle experiences in gen 8's equivalent of a battle tree. I'm pretty sure dynamax will be featured but is that enough to keep us on toe if we can just hit back, likely even harder than the AI? That remains to be seen. I do hope we'll get less crappy sets in the super mode and that some old sets will be changed and improved, e.g. Ferrothorn. I have yet to see Leech Seed from it.
Another welcome change would be to use more different spreads; in most cases, you have the generic 252/252 split, but something individual that allows a Pkm to survive certain hits? That would be interesting, especially in Doubles. I mean they could some spreads from the champion world ship if that is okay with the players.
 
I think the scariest thing about the facilities will be trying to figure out how the AI uses Dynamaxing. We already know they fix the fights against you, so your sand team now has to fight the rain brigade while dyna gyarados flops all over you.

Or the AI will wait to whoever is last in their party to supersize
 

Yung Dramps

awesome gaming
Once again I find myself bored with nothing interesting to do in the middle of school. Last time this happened, I made the original "how many Pokemon are currently in the Galar dex?" post complete with demographic breakdowns. This post also involves the regional pokedex, but this time I'm gonna try something a little more... ...off the wall.

Using previous regional pokedex counts between original games and their enhanced ports as a guide, I will attempt to mathematically calculate/properly estimate the total Pokemon count in the Galar Pokedex. Yes, it might be a bit reachy to rely on the patterns I'm going to estimate shortly to figure out this important statistic, and I in no way expect this to be exact at all. In fact, I'll be surprised if I even get within a 50 Pokemon margin of error of the actual total. Also, whatever you think of this post, please do not take it as pretext to argue over [REDACTED]. I know this warning is the equivalent of giving a pyromaniac a flamethrower and asking him not to burn anything down, but please at least try.

With all the disclaimers out of the way, let's begin.

Part 1: Past Regional Dexes
To start, let's look at the size of previous games' regional Pokedexes starting from Generation 4, where Pokemon were added in enhanced ports.. Speaking of which, we will also be looking at how these change in each gens' enhanced ports. These stats come from Pokemon DB.

Diamond/Pearl: 151 Pokemon
Platinum: 210 Pokemon
+61

Black/White: 155 Pokemon
Black 2/White 2: 300 Pokemon
+145

X/Y: Not yet. This is a special case.

Sun/Moon: 302 Pokemon
Ultra Sun/Ultra Moon: 403 Pokemon
+101

Part 1.5: Concerning Kalos

Kalos is a special case since it never got an enhanced port: Instead it was just a single game with a sprawling regional Pokedex of 457 Pokemon, the biggest in any game. This roster surpasses any enhanced port, so what we're gonna do is this: Let's pretend X and Y had a more limited roster while the 457 was reserved for a hypothetical Pokemon Z or X and Y 2 or whatever. Now, how do we figure out a feasable Pokemon count of this more limited X and Y? By averaging the Pokemon added per enhanced port and subtracting it from 457, of course!

(61 + 145 + 101) / 3= 102 (Rounded down to nearest whole number)
457 - 102= 355

Part 2: How Much Does the Initial Regional Dex Grow Every New Generation?

Let's figure it out by comparing each generation's growth.

Black and White have 4 more Pokemon (155-151) than Diamond and Pearl.

Our estimated restricted X and Y have 200 more Pokemon (355-155) than Black and White.

Sun and Moon have 53 less Pokemon (355-302) than X and Y.

At first, these stats seem unworkable. There's too much variance! But nonetheless, I will once again estimate the Pokemon gain per new generation via the wonders of averaging.

(4 + 200 - 53) / 3= 50 (Rounded down to the nearest whole number)

To see how accurate this estimate is, let's see how close this is to Sun and Moon's final number when starting from Diamond and Pearl.

151 (DP dex) + (50 x 3 [Black and White, X and Y and Sun and Moon]) = 301

Wow! Only one off from the real deal! Of course, you can feel free to take this with a 50-ton pile of salt with all the variance and exceptions throughout the years, but I consider it accurate enough to continue to the final stage with this number.

Part 3: The (Potential) Final Tally!
And now for the moment you've all been waiting for!

Base Sword and Shield Roster
302 (Sun and Moon) + 50 = 352

Enhanced Ports (Could also be used as a basis if they skip these entirely and immediately move on to past gen remakes or another generation)
352 + 102 = 464

For the very last time, these are merely estimates: I am in no way, shape or form trying to advertise this wall of mathematics as the true, indisputable size of the Galar Pokedex. But considering all the math I've done and the trends I've noted, I think this is at least a somewhat decent look at what we can expect to see, assuming a good-sized margin of error.
 
Last edited:

ScraftyIsTheBest

On to new Horizons!
is a Top Contributor Alumnusis a Smogon Media Contributor Alumnus
Once again I find myself bored with nothing interesting to do in the middle of school. Last time this happened, I made the original "how many Pokemon are currently in the Galar dex?" post complete with demographic breakdowns. This post also involves the regional pokedex, but this time I'm gonna try something a little more... ...off the wall.

Using previous regional pokedex counts between original games and their enhanced ports as a guide, I will attempt to mathematically calculate/properly estimate the total Pokemon count in the Galar Pokedex. Yes, it might be a bit reachy to rely on the patterns I'm going to estimate shortly to figure out this important statistic, and I in no way expect this to be exact at all. In fact, I'll be surprised if I even get within a 50 Pokemon margin of error of the actual total. Also, whatever you think of this post, please do not take it as pretext to argue over [REDACTED]. I know this warning is the equivalent of giving a pyromaniac a flamethrower and asking him not to burn anything down, but please at least try.

With all the disclaimers out of the way, let's begin.

Part 1: Past Regional Dexes
To start, let's look at the size of previous games' regional Pokedexes starting from Generation 4, where Pokemon were added in enhanced ports.. Speaking of which, we will also be looking at how these change in each gens' enhanced ports. These stats come from Pokemon DB.

Diamond/Pearl: 151 Pokemon
Platinum: 210 Pokemon
+61

Black/White: 155 Pokemon
Black 2/White 2: 300 Pokemon
+145

X/Y: Not yet. This is a special case.

Sun/Moon: 302 Pokemon
Ultra Sun/Ultra Moon: 403 Pokemon
+101

Part 1.5: Concerning Kalos

Kalos is a special case since it never got an enhanced port: Instead it was just a single game with a sprawling regional Pokedex of 457 Pokemon, the biggest in any game. This roster surpasses any enhanced port, so what we're gonna do is this: Let's pretend X and Y had a more limited roster while the 457 was reserved for a hypothetical Pokemon Z or X and Y 2 or whatever. Now, how we figure out a feasable Pokemon count of this more limited X and Y? by averaging the Pokemon added per enhanced port and subtracting it from 457, of course?

(61 + 145 + 101) / 3= 102 (Rounded down to nearest whole number)
457 - 102= 355

Part 2: How Much Does the Initial Regional Dex Grow Every New Generation?

Let's figure it out by comparing each generation's growth.

Black and White have 4 more Pokemon (155-151) than Diamond and Pearl.

Our estimated restricted X and Y have 200 more Pokemon (355-155) than Black and White.

Sun and Moon have 53 less Pokemon (355-302) than X and Y.

At first, these stats seem unworkable. There's too much variance! But nonetheless, I will once again estimate the Pokemon gain per new generation via the wonders of averaging.

(4 + 200 - 53) / 3= 50 (Rounded down to the nearest whole number)

To see how accurate this estimate is, let's see how close this is to Sun and Moon's final number when starting from Diamond and Pearl.

151 (DP dex) + (50 x 3 [Black and White, X and Y and Sun and Moon]) = 301

Wow! Only one off from the real deal! Of course, you can feel free to take this with a 50-ton pile of salt with all the variance and exceptions throughout the years, but I consider it accurate enough to continue to the final stage with this number.

Part 3: The (Potential) Final Tally!
And now for the moment you've all been waiting for!

Base Sword and Shield Roster
302 (Sun and Moon) + 50 = 352

Enhanced Ports (Could also be used as a basis if they skip these entirely and immediately move on to past gen remakes or another generation)
352 + 102 = 464

For the very last time, these are merely estimates: I am in no way, shape or form trying to advertise this wall of mathematics as the true, indisputable size of the Galar Pokedex. But considering all the math I've done and the trends I've noted, I think this is at least a somewhat decent look at what we can expect to see, assuming a good-sized margin of error.
Pretty recently from various news sites I came across via Twitter it's been confirmed, at least according to the Official Galar Dex guidebook that will be coming around the time of Sword and Shield's release (according to people who have early access to it, that is) that the Galar Dex will have around 500 Pokemon or so. It's hard to truly discern a pattern based on past generations, but various sources have suggested that Galar's base dex will be even bigger than that of Kalos (ie X and Y). X and Y already had a huge dex of Pokemon available and Sword and Shield is actually aiming to have an even bigger dex than X and Y did.

So your estimate for enhanced Galar entries is much closer to what various sources have implied is the actual Galar dex size (~500 Pokemon), and if/when they do a third version/sequel whatever, it may strive to have an even bigger dex of around possible 600, if not possibly more Pokemon in it.

Just wanted to put that out there.
 
Pretty recently from various news sites I came across via Twitter it's been confirmed, at least according to the Official Galar Dex guidebook that will be coming around the time of Sword and Shield's release (according to people who have early access to it, that is) that the Galar Dex will have around 500 Pokemon or so. It's hard to truly discern a pattern based on past generations, but various sources have suggested that Galar's base dex will be even bigger than that of Kalos (ie X and Y). X and Y already had a huge dex of Pokemon available and Sword and Shield is actually aiming to have an even bigger dex than X and Y did.

So your estimate for enhanced Galar entries is much closer to what various sources have implied is the actual Galar dex size (~500 Pokemon), and if/when they do a third version/sequel whatever, it may strive to have an even bigger dex of around possible 600, if not possibly more Pokemon in it.

Just wanted to put that out there.
Important to note that the guidebook estimates are solely based on comparing the page count to SM or USUM's pokedex guide page counts, which crucially assumes a similar number of pokemon per page. None of the blurbs for the SwSh guide give any estimates of pokedex size as far as I know, so I wouldn't call it confirmed, just a reasonable enough guess/estimate.
 

Yung Dramps

awesome gaming
Pretty recently from various news sites I came across via Twitter it's been confirmed, at least according to the Official Galar Dex guidebook that will be coming around the time of Sword and Shield's release (according to people who have early access to it, that is) that the Galar Dex will have around 500 Pokemon or so.
Woah, woah, HOLD UP A SEC. People have received early access to the full pokedex guidebook? If they actually own copies of it, that's HUGE. Forget an estimate based on page count, this sounds like a huge leak on par with the Sun and Moon demo waiting to happen! It's too good to be true, I feel like I'm misreading something here.
 
Woah, woah, HOLD UP A SEC. People have received early access to the full pokedex guidebook? If they actually own copies of it, that's HUGE. Forget an estimate based on page count, this sounds like a huge leak on par with the Sun and Moon demo waiting to happen! It's too good to be true, I feel like I'm misreading something here.
Pretty sure nobody has leaked the book, it's just gone up on Amazon, etc., for preorders, which includes information like the page count.
 

Xucrute

mt tchola
is a Social Media Contributor Alumnus
Uh, not sure if someone posted this.
the curry gives you xp, restores HP and increases friendship (which was expected), but it got me wondering if different recipes have different effects, like EV reducing, EV Training like the FP had with the bouncy houses and food stalls, which i'd be fine with give sometimes you don't have the right amount of berries nor the vitamins to work with.
 

Pikachu315111

Ranting & Raving!
is a Community Contributoris a Top Smogon Media Contributor
Uh, not sure if someone posted this.
the curry gives you xp, restores HP and increases friendship (which was expected), but it got me wondering if different recipes have different effects, like EV reducing, EV Training like the FP had with the bouncy houses and food stalls, which i'd be fine with give sometimes you don't have the right amount of berries nor the vitamins to work with.
Makes me wonder if you can possibly mess up and give your Pokemon negative effects:

Taste Rating: Trubbish Class
Your Pokemon have been Poisoned!
Your Pokemon lost a few Effort Values!
Wooloo and the rest of your party hate you!
 
Oh, I've forgotten to post a buncha stuff on this thread, been outta the loop.

Regarding the Save Message: Technically, an autosave has been in the game since the beginning of the series if you count the game saving when you beat the Champion. Also it popping up when the player goes inside a building seems kinda weird to me... Maybe it's saving for some other reason, like a surprise trade since those can go on in the background?

Regarding Pokedex Size: I kinda got clickbaited by this, but the listing for the Sword and Shield Pokedex book is out and it's 448 pages compared to the 384 pages for the Sun/Moon one. (and 720 for the USUM full pokedex book) Still nothing to give real guesses on (which is where i got clickbaited), but it does indicate that we will have a larger Pokedex than Sun/Moon, unless they do something asinine like only put one Pokemon on a page (SuMo and USUM pokedex books have 2 per page, mostly), especially since the description doesn't mention any coverage for Post-game stuff. (and it looks like others fell for that trap too.)

Also, I am going to say my final guess/prediction for Corviknight's base HP is 96, going by 2 pictures on the website and heavy guessing. Explanation:



If we assume that these are supposedly representatives of freshly caught raid 'mons, then assuming that they have 0EVs makes sense. Bottom picture is the Corviknight with the Hidden Ability, so it also would make sense that they would want to also further show it off as better by giving it 31IVs. A base 96 stat returns 171hp with the formula, which is what the Corviknight in the picture has. Not only that, but base 96 HP with 20 IVs and 0 EVs returns 166hp, which is what the top, "average" Corviknight in the top picture has. That and the fact that a lot of the other screenshots have been indicating a base HP around that range with similar assumptions has lead me to my conclusion that Corviknight probably has base 96 HP.
 


New update seen here.

Fighting type with Steadfast ability. Description:

Only        that have survived many battles can attain this       . When this Pokémon's              ers, it will retire from combat.
The Japanese page offers a bit more information. Some of the characters are mirrored, but its name apparently ends in ナイト (night or knight), or I guess it can start with トイナ.
 
Last edited:
I highly doubt it's Farfetch'd. A standard Farfetch'd weights 33.1 lbs. / 15 kg. This new Pokemon weighs 7 times as much, clocking in at 257.9 lbs / 116.9 kg. Unless Galarian Farfetch'd puts on some serious weight, or Sirfetch'd is a c h u n k y b o i , I think this is something new entirely.

Edit: Actually, on second thought, I really don't know because that "lance" looks a LOT like Farfetch'd's leek, and the body plan is pretty similar. Given that it's pure Fighting instead of Flying, the massive amount of weight it gains is most likely due to its "armor" and it might not be able to fly anymore because of it.
 
Last edited:


New update seen here.
Truly, if this weren't related to the release of a Pokémon game, I'd think it was a deliberate teaser - the bizarrely glitchy image with just enough detail to speculate on, the tantalising bits of information left unredacted, the implication that something's about to be revealed.
 
Now the 25 Attack buff to Farfetch'd, which was tied with Swellow's 25 Special Attack buff as the highest singular stat buff SM gave to an older Pokemon, makes sense. They did a similar sort of thing two times with other Pokemon before in 6th gen:

-Beedrill getting 10 points into Attack in XY so Mega Beedrill in ORAS can reach 150 Attack upon Mega Evolving so they didn't have to leave Mega Beedrill with 5 SpA lmao.

-Pidgeot getting 10 points into Speed in XY so Mega Pidgeot in ORAS can reach 121 Speed upon Mega Evolving within that +100 mega stat buff limit.

Yup, I'm totally convinced now that it's Galarian Farfetch'd.
 

Yung Dramps

awesome gaming
Assuming that fan render is more or less what the real thing will look like...

...Then holy shit, the Galarian form line-up thus far has been absolutely OUTSTANDING. Sirfetch'd, Obstagoon and Galarian Weezing all qualify for the best Pokemon in the regional dex thus far, at least in my opinion. And as the biggest fanboy of this mechanic ever, you better believe this fills me with joy. To go from dreading the possibility of them being scrapped to them returning bigger and better than ever within the span of a month... ...man does it feel good!

Also, I'm 99% sure this is an evolution, not a regular Galarian form for base Fetch'd. Note the "Only        that have survived many battles can attain this       ." line, which to me seems like when completed it would read "Only Farfetch'd that have survived many battles can attain this form/evolution.", as well as the bigger leek and shield. Personally, I'm not even certain that we'll actually get a regular Galarian Farfetch'd due to only this evo being mentioned and how it'd probably look kinda boring aside from a color change. Then again, Normal/Flying ---> Fighting would be a pretty weird type change for a normal cross-gen evo, and while I love Obstagoon, Galarian Zigzagoon/Linoone looked kinda bland, so...
 
Then again, Normal/Flying ---> Fighting would be a pretty weird type change for a normal cross-gen evo
Which is kinda funny as I've seen plenty of ROM Hacks that attempted to make Farfetch'd useful by giving it a Fighting-type. PURE Fighting is weird, though, unless its Flying-typing is also part of the "glitched" data.

Also, it seems it's themed around jousting, or at least that's what it makes me think.
 

Users Who Are Viewing This Thread (Users: 1, Guests: 5)

Top