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Sword & Shield **Official news only** DLC Crown Tundra 22nd October
- Thread starter DHR-107
- Start date
I’m having flashbacks to the pelago exploit now- just EV trained a whole team in under 10 minutes.
Is there any chance of them fixing the date exploits at this point? Idk if the switch date stuff works differently than 3DS or what, but I’d imagine they at the very least want to if it currently allows the same thing they removed on Sun and Moon.
Is there any chance of them fixing the date exploits at this point? Idk if the switch date stuff works differently than 3DS or what, but I’d imagine they at the very least want to if it currently allows the same thing they removed on Sun and Moon.
Pikachu315111;
Sorry for the late reply. I wanted to get this done before Christmas but I got so busy that I haven't had the time until now.
Good that you managed to stay away from story spoilers at least!
As for the fossils, they all seem a bit... derpy? But I guess that's intended. And I'm actually okay with that, they all feel a bit incomplete and fractured compared to the "perfect" fossils of past generations. I also liked how every fossil was created by combining two different fossil parts into a new Pokémon. They tried something new here and I think it was successful so I definitely approve of that.
And big thanks for your advice! I had heard that Galarian Yamask had a really complicated and strange evolution method, that turned out to be very true. I had two Focus Sashes so I just used one of them to evolve it into... Runerigus. A pretty cool Pokémon, I kind of want to train one for some serious usage but who knows if I'll ever get around to that.
I am also happy about their new experimentations though I do agree that some old Pokémon got sideshafted, it wouldn't have hurt to create Galarian forms for Persian and Cofagrigus too, as well as maybe Mime Jr. and Koffing. I wonder why they created entirely new Pokémon in Perrserker and Runerigus instead of just making Galarian versions of Persian and Cofagrigus, my guess would be that they were too different from the originals to be called regional variants.
Yeah, something like this would have been very welcome.
And on a slightly different note, I finally looked at all the Pokémon that can Gigantamax... and I'm a little disappointed. 10 from Gen 1, 1 from Gen 5 (which is Garbodor), Melmetal and then 14 from Gen 8 (though it seems like Flapple and Appletun have the same Gigantamax form). So that's a bit disappointing. They managed to give a rather equal focus on all generations for many other things in the games, but with Gigantamax it is mainly Gen 1 and Gen 8, and that is a shame.
As much as I like trainer customization, I agree that it needs to be improved. Oddly, I think X/Y mostly did it the best despite being the first games to feature it. I'm not sure if I'd go as far as to say that it has been going downhill since then, it has at least not been improving as much as it could and should have. That said, I'm still happy that they are keeping it.
I think sequels might work for S/S. As one of the few who I actually liked the story, I wouldn't mind seeing a sequel. They could expand on some of the new roles for the characters like how Bede and Marnie are doing as Gym Leaders, Sonia as the new Professor with Hop as her assistant and maybe a new Champion after the previous one (the player character from S/S) left for a distant region... just some ideas. The base for the story could be the Gym Challenge once more. No idea about the legendaries or their part in the story though. Alternate versions like with US/UM might also work (but then they should improve the story similar to what Platinum did to D/P), I have to say that I honestly enjoyed US/UM a lot despite the fact that they could have been better, so I would be kinda okay with that too.
After playing through Sword, I'm honestly not sure anymore. I have been gradually losing interest in Pokémon since OR/AS and I am definitely quitting being a hardcore player after US/UM. Dexit was a huge blow for me and if that's the future of the series, then I don't really want to support it all that much anymore. I might still get future games but as said, it depends on which Pokémon will be featured in them. If say, we get all existing Pokémon between S/S, D/P remakes and S/S sequels/alternative versions, then I can imagine getting one from each pair. If not, then I'm not sure. I have no interest in watching let's players though (since as said, I don't care that much for the story anymore) and not Showdown either as I'm not a competitive battler. There are also many other Switch games that I'd rather play. Apart from not being done with XC2 I am also planning to get Link's Awakening and Smash Ultimate in the future, then there's DLC for BOTW and XC2 that I'm interested in as well. So even if I'm not quitting completely, Pokémon will no longer have my full focus like it has been having in the past.
That said, I guess I won't be quitting completely anytime soon. I'll still keep on reading Pokémon Adventures, really curious about how they'll handle the S/S chapter. Will they screw it up like with S/M/US/UM or improve upon the game story in a similar way to X/Y, or will they just keep the parts of the game story that I liked and improve upon them? Definitely going to read the rest of it as it gets released. As for the games, I'll continue playing the older games (though currently on a break from that), I have promised myself that I am going to go back and complete a certain big thing in a certain generation at some point in the future, so that will be done.
As for the discussion that happened after this regarding Gen 5 remakes, I agree that it is unlikely that they will happen before we get D/P remakes. I believe what Kurona said is true, the presence of the Gen 5 Pokémon and legendaries in S/S feels more like a way to tie in with Gen 5 recently debuting in Pokémon Go. And I have mixed opinions on Gen 5 remakes since I love Gen 5 but I am not a huge fan of Pokémon remakes. But it feels like they are very far in the future so I guess there's not much to worry about regarding that at this point. And we're getting off track now, so I'll end this and focus on writing on my S/S team post like I should.
Sorry for the late reply. I wanted to get this done before Christmas but I got so busy that I haven't had the time until now.
I had a similar experience during the pre-English release period for D/P. I had planned to go into them unspoiled, but it just fell apart. At first, I decided to just look into a few small details, so I started by checking the base stats of Palkia and Dialga because I wanted to know how strong they were. It continued from there, and before I knew it, I had spoiled myself for practically everything in the games. Though that situation was a bit different since it was 10 months between the Japanese and European releases of D/P. Looking back, I was very naive to think that I could stay unspoiled for such a long time while also spending a lot of time on Pokémon sites.
Good that you managed to stay away from story spoilers at least!
There's a lot they could do in terms of version differences apart from just Pokémon, you have several good ideas. I'll give them credit for having some version exclusive Gym Leaders this time around, but there's a lot more they could do with it, that's for sure. As for keeping version exclusive Pokémon even during the post-game, I'd guess that they want to encourage connectivity between players (and now that online isn't free anymore, they want us to pay for it) as well as get more money from those like me who used to buy both games. I would definitely approve of them getting rid of version exclusive Pokémon during the post-game, but I guess that's not going to happen anytime soon.
I got around to obtaining all the remaining fossils and the evolution to Galarian Yamask yesterday, so I have now seen all of the new Pokémon.
As for the fossils, they all seem a bit... derpy? But I guess that's intended. And I'm actually okay with that, they all feel a bit incomplete and fractured compared to the "perfect" fossils of past generations. I also liked how every fossil was created by combining two different fossil parts into a new Pokémon. They tried something new here and I think it was successful so I definitely approve of that.
And big thanks for your advice! I had heard that Galarian Yamask had a really complicated and strange evolution method, that turned out to be very true. I had two Focus Sashes so I just used one of them to evolve it into... Runerigus. A pretty cool Pokémon, I kind of want to train one for some serious usage but who knows if I'll ever get around to that.
Fair enough. I just remember that several of the new evolutions were extremely hated during the D/P days. Not only the ones you mentioned but also others like Yanmega, Mismagius and especially Probopass. The new Baby Pokémon also got a lot of hate for various reasons.
I am also happy about their new experimentations though I do agree that some old Pokémon got sideshafted, it wouldn't have hurt to create Galarian forms for Persian and Cofagrigus too, as well as maybe Mime Jr. and Koffing. I wonder why they created entirely new Pokémon in Perrserker and Runerigus instead of just making Galarian versions of Persian and Cofagrigus, my guess would be that they were too different from the originals to be called regional variants.
I agree, they didn't need to introduce even more new items that have to do with evolution. While they can get away with removing several old items now thanks to Dexit, that does not really make it okay to add even more new ones. They should make use of the ones they already have instead. And I heard that they changed the evolution methods for some Eeveelutions and a few others too, that's neat.
Yeah, it seems like some wild Pokémon are going to be a pain to find because of the weather in the wild area. This would have been acceptable for old Pokémon, but not for too many of the new ones. I agree that all old Pokémon should be reasonably easy to find (I'm okay with one or a few being rare such as the pseudo-legendary of every generation) but not too many like it was in Gen 7. I think S/S did mostly well here but there are a few unfortunate ones.
This is something I want to see as well. I really liked how you could encounter starters from previous generations in the wild in the Friend Safari in X/Y and through Island Scan in Gen 7. S/S didn't do that well though, you just get a gift Charmander after beating the game and that seems to be it.
Yeah, something like this would have been very welcome.
I agree, this is one aspect of the Wild Area that could have been executed better.
I see. Because of all of this, I definitely agree that Gigantamax could have been better executed, I hope they can make it better in future games.
And on a slightly different note, I finally looked at all the Pokémon that can Gigantamax... and I'm a little disappointed. 10 from Gen 1, 1 from Gen 5 (which is Garbodor), Melmetal and then 14 from Gen 8 (though it seems like Flapple and Appletun have the same Gigantamax form). So that's a bit disappointing. They managed to give a rather equal focus on all generations for many other things in the games, but with Gigantamax it is mainly Gen 1 and Gen 8, and that is a shame.
I see. It felt very inspired by Go to me but I guess it wasn't quite the case. And it seems like several things carried over from Let's Go too, guess I should give them the credit for introducing all of these things as opposed to S/S then.
As much as I like trainer customization, I agree that it needs to be improved. Oddly, I think X/Y mostly did it the best despite being the first games to feature it. I'm not sure if I'd go as far as to say that it has been going downhill since then, it has at least not been improving as much as it could and should have. That said, I'm still happy that they are keeping it.
This is a great idea! That would have been an excellent opportunity to add all of them in the game.
Hmm, good point. I have barely noticed any difference, they still sound the same to me even if they have been updated... which makes me think it is time to update them more or even better, introduce new sound effects. Though I guess replacing certain sound effects might be a bit of a risk at this point since they have been around for so long that some fans will probably complain if they are changed or updated too much.
Now that you say it, I think that's going to be the case. And that's a good thing because there are a lot of other Pokémon I think needs to get another Physical Fairy-type move besides of Play Rough.
After thinking about this for a bit, I'm going to have to agree with you here. His part in the post-game story was great, I also like how he is the big brother of Marnie and the "captain" of Team Yell. Plus he is the first Dark-type Leader in the series!
I agree. They should definitely go for a more cartoon-y and/or cel-shaded graphical style over the more realistic style they are using for certain things like the trees. It would also feel better with the Pokémon and the characters since it can clash pretty hard if you are using two vastly different graphical styles.
I see. It is as bad as I feared then. Well, that just means I will not be spending that much time training Pokémon in the game. Though I didn't know it was possible to battle the breeder in the Wild Area multiple times a day, might give that a try if I feel like looking for her more than once.
No GTS? Oh well. Flawed as it was, the basic function of it did at least work. I was planning to use the Wi-Fi section here on the forums, I have always gotten great help from there in the past, but I might try other sites as well.
I see. Well I'm not even sure if I'll try the entire dex, but all Galar Pokémon and Galarian forms at least (though I already have the vast majority of them apart from the Shield exclusives, so it looks like this will go by quickly). I'll definitely keep an eye out for new events and stuff, there have already been several unexpected small ones which are nice like the various balls and the 20 BP. And of course the Gigantamax Meowth which I got. I would personally not mind DLC even if it was paid, if they can expand on the game in some way that I'm interested in, it would be worth paying for. But of course, they could have added that into the base games...
Sounds like something that might very well happen.
I think sequels might work for S/S. As one of the few who I actually liked the story, I wouldn't mind seeing a sequel. They could expand on some of the new roles for the characters like how Bede and Marnie are doing as Gym Leaders, Sonia as the new Professor with Hop as her assistant and maybe a new Champion after the previous one (the player character from S/S) left for a distant region... just some ideas. The base for the story could be the Gym Challenge once more. No idea about the legendaries or their part in the story though. Alternate versions like with US/UM might also work (but then they should improve the story similar to what Platinum did to D/P), I have to say that I honestly enjoyed US/UM a lot despite the fact that they could have been better, so I would be kinda okay with that too.
After playing through Sword, I'm honestly not sure anymore. I have been gradually losing interest in Pokémon since OR/AS and I am definitely quitting being a hardcore player after US/UM. Dexit was a huge blow for me and if that's the future of the series, then I don't really want to support it all that much anymore. I might still get future games but as said, it depends on which Pokémon will be featured in them. If say, we get all existing Pokémon between S/S, D/P remakes and S/S sequels/alternative versions, then I can imagine getting one from each pair. If not, then I'm not sure. I have no interest in watching let's players though (since as said, I don't care that much for the story anymore) and not Showdown either as I'm not a competitive battler. There are also many other Switch games that I'd rather play. Apart from not being done with XC2 I am also planning to get Link's Awakening and Smash Ultimate in the future, then there's DLC for BOTW and XC2 that I'm interested in as well. So even if I'm not quitting completely, Pokémon will no longer have my full focus like it has been having in the past.
That said, I guess I won't be quitting completely anytime soon. I'll still keep on reading Pokémon Adventures, really curious about how they'll handle the S/S chapter. Will they screw it up like with S/M/US/UM or improve upon the game story in a similar way to X/Y, or will they just keep the parts of the game story that I liked and improve upon them? Definitely going to read the rest of it as it gets released. As for the games, I'll continue playing the older games (though currently on a break from that), I have promised myself that I am going to go back and complete a certain big thing in a certain generation at some point in the future, so that will be done.
As for the discussion that happened after this regarding Gen 5 remakes, I agree that it is unlikely that they will happen before we get D/P remakes. I believe what Kurona said is true, the presence of the Gen 5 Pokémon and legendaries in S/S feels more like a way to tie in with Gen 5 recently debuting in Pokémon Go. And I have mixed opinions on Gen 5 remakes since I love Gen 5 but I am not a huge fan of Pokémon remakes. But it feels like they are very far in the future so I guess there's not much to worry about regarding that at this point. And we're getting off track now, so I'll end this and focus on writing on my S/S team post like I should.
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I beat Sword. For the 'endgame' of the story I decided to go with a static team into the stadium, but the game lasted longer than I thought and I ended up leveling a lot (~5-8 levels from high 40s to mid 50s?). It helped for the surprisingly high level battles at least. I'll save the discussion for the ingame team thread. It was a smooth ride, though deaths were common and I suffered a loss in the Battle Tower, ended up maxing Dynamax level to win. Camp was used but no grinding/candies, and I appreciated the lack of grind needed. It seems like you get more camp EXP the friendlier your pokemon. My starter Inteleon had about a ~10 level lead over the rest of my rotating team and all it did was Snipe Shot and Metronome. Some movepools kind of sad.
My Linoone ended up evolving in the tower, so I guess the story was actually night-time at that point. It was late and I'll miss the Pickups along the way. Speaking of which, it's nice that you get the nighttime backgrounds for cards at the point where cities can actually be seen at night.
Used a guide for some TMs. A couple were in Circhester where I completely missed some buildings, and a few on some routes with 'hidden' paths. This led me to a random level 10 trainer and the Steel Beam tutor guy.
In the end Dreepy didn't get good in time for anything; Draco Meteor is probably its best upgrade. It seems like you don't need to max happiness to learn it now, I noticed a freshly caught Flygon was eligible.
I liked the game. Spent ~70 hours on-off apparently, most of it probably in the wild area. Ribbon titles are fun, but marks were rare. The postgame was like a mini regular campaign, except nobody gave you a free heal. Raids are neat when you can get in with people and succeed. I've managed a couple 5* on my own. Not much left to have to do other than pokedex, have about half to go. Unlike Gen 7 my seen count still has quite a bit left from 400. I expect some final evolutions, a few wild area things that I skipped and then some 1% rustling grass spawns in routes or something.
I guess I could get in the battle stadium (for the 2nd time ever), don't have to worry about banking things up for now + rental teams are a thing. Also in the battle tower there's a computer that just displays some dialogue about Ranked Battles and does nothing else, kind of odd.
EDIT: Sword and shield could use some polish all around but it's playable to the end.
EDIT 2: Just picked it back up and remembered something annoying and common, especially for Sirfetch'd. The critical hit message lasts too long. Why do you have to wait for it and have no option to press past it?
My Linoone ended up evolving in the tower, so I guess the story was actually night-time at that point. It was late and I'll miss the Pickups along the way. Speaking of which, it's nice that you get the nighttime backgrounds for cards at the point where cities can actually be seen at night.
Used a guide for some TMs. A couple were in Circhester where I completely missed some buildings, and a few on some routes with 'hidden' paths. This led me to a random level 10 trainer and the Steel Beam tutor guy.
In the end Dreepy didn't get good in time for anything; Draco Meteor is probably its best upgrade. It seems like you don't need to max happiness to learn it now, I noticed a freshly caught Flygon was eligible.
I liked the game. Spent ~70 hours on-off apparently, most of it probably in the wild area. Ribbon titles are fun, but marks were rare. The postgame was like a mini regular campaign, except nobody gave you a free heal. Raids are neat when you can get in with people and succeed. I've managed a couple 5* on my own. Not much left to have to do other than pokedex, have about half to go. Unlike Gen 7 my seen count still has quite a bit left from 400. I expect some final evolutions, a few wild area things that I skipped and then some 1% rustling grass spawns in routes or something.
I guess I could get in the battle stadium (for the 2nd time ever), don't have to worry about banking things up for now + rental teams are a thing. Also in the battle tower there's a computer that just displays some dialogue about Ranked Battles and does nothing else, kind of odd.
EDIT: Sword and shield could use some polish all around but it's playable to the end.
EDIT 2: Just picked it back up and remembered something annoying and common, especially for Sirfetch'd. The critical hit message lasts too long. Why do you have to wait for it and have no option to press past it?
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My guess is HOME, Sleep and maybe a Gigantamax event.
I'm also expecting some "damage control" about the little issue they had with hacked raids in the last days.
It's a pretty dangerous situation since it's both creating wrong expectations on people (I've seen several thinking the entire pokedex is present when it's not), and it's also proved it's possible to connect to the servers with altered game data.
Since it's gonna be Home, I'm guessing the Gigantamax event announced will be Melmetal.
I'm personally just hoping on a SwSh update that adds Furret to the game and nothing else
EDIT: Right, forgot about the foreign Pokemon.
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There's 35 pokemon not in the galar dex but are in the game, presumably the hacking has been those specifically. I saw a tweet about a squirtle raid, for example
Last time we had a Direct of this length (19+ minutes), they filled it all with Bank + Kanto starter Megas.
We already know what Bank is and that HOME is essentially a powered-up version of it, though. They can probably cut all that out. I'm more or less expecting a demo for how it works and more interested in the Go mechanics tbh.
I just thought of something: You think it's possible they'll give us a sneak peek of that upcoming Twilight Wings miniseries? I dunno if a Pokemon Direct has ever given info on anime stuff, but it's worth speculating about I think.
Tecnically that's all we know of it. That it's Bank+GTS.
For what matters, it could be much more. Could have battle sim, or a integrated "camp-like", or a National Dex, or anything.
Emphasis on "could" though, because having any expectation when it's GameFreaks is a waste of effort.
If it's a separate subscription charge, that'll probably be my impetus to quit the series. There's zero chance I'm making the *irreversible* decision to put my Pokemon on an app that they can't be removed from for years, and if that's the case, I'll be extremely annoyed that they waited to tell us until it's too late to meaningfully affect sales of the games themselves.
Why would you be annoyed at what's an actually legit and solid marketing strategy that's used by most companies, not strictly related to videogames? :P
Because I think that a whole lot of marketing should be taken down a couple pegs, not just video games?
I mean, they told us the release date, and this isn't like the games themselves where they want to build up chatter and thus release bits and pieces of new info to get the fanbase excited leading up to release. Knowing more about them over the past couple of months doesn't really change anything.
They didn't tell us the release date, though. It was just early 2020. That is meaningless. That could be this month to like April.
Because, while being completely legit and solid from a marketing standpoint, not revealing the details of one of your game's main connected services and its compatibility is legit shitty from a customer service perspective, and we're all customers. A tale of two sides.
No, just early 2020