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I mean I get why he wants an army of powerful Pokemon. It's the focus on ultra beasts specifically that sets me off. Sure, someone trying to build an army of powerful Pokemon would naturally be interested in ultra beasts, but they would also be interested in Pokemon like Dragonite or Volcarona. The way RR Giovanni phrases it, it sounds like he's interested in ultra beasts not out of pragmatism, but because "oooh aliens are cool and strong, so if I have an army of aliens, I will be cool and strong".
While I agree the "just an army of Ultra Beasts" sounds kind of goofy (especially since Legendaries are still stronger and have more metaphysical power), using whole squads of Ultra Beasts doesn't seem that farfetched if you consider two things: 1. No one in the Pokemon worlds would ever have seen an Ultra Beast so seeing this super strange creatures invading your world would cause major panic and chaos and 2. Ultra Beasts not fully used to another world get the "Totem Aura" and stat boost along with it so they come out of the gate with a buff.
While I agree the "just an army of Ultra Beasts" sounds kind of goofy (especially since Legendaries are still stronger and have more metaphysical power), using whole squads of Ultra Beasts doesn't seem that farfetched if you consider two things: 1. No one in the Pokemon worlds would ever have seen an Ultra Beast so seeing this super strange creatures invading your world would cause major panic and chaos and 2. Ultra Beasts not fully used to another world get the "Totem Aura" and stat boost along with it so they come out of the gate with a buff.
Absolutely. I remember the first time I battled Nihilego (when it shows up with a ??? as its name) I had absolutely no idea how I was supposed to defeat it. I hadn't read any guides and my team was a bit underleveled, to the point where Nihilego defeated almost my entire team before I figured out a move to hit it super effectively with. Now, imagine that scenario into the lore of Pokemon where these (ultra) beasts could actually kill, maim and destroy AND with more and stronger UBs. It would be terrifying to a good chunk of the population and a lot of those who do fight back would fall in combat
To put it in real world terms, imagine you brought an AK-47 to the times of, say, the early 19th century. You have this magical machine that is infinitely superior to the technology of the time, as destructive as a Gatling and as portable as a musket, while being far easier to use. You'd be venerated as some sort of God-sent entity. Now imagine bringing a whole platoon of soldiers all armed to the teeth. The only thing that could even hope to stop you is running out of bullets or maybe some tactical genius, which Pokemon/Ultra Beasts don't seem to be capable of, and the only tactical geniused around are apparently your Gary Stus/Mary Sues protagonists and perhaps others such as Champions and Battle Facility Masters. And with enough UBs even they would fall. If you really think about it, as fantastic as it sounds for someone to try to shoot for even for Pokemon standards, it makes sense
Speaking of warcrimes, what they did to Lusamine's character in USUM should qualify as one
I don't think pokemon is a great fit for a Metroidvania style map. Don't get me wrong, a large world with puzzles is a lot better than a large world with nothing, but I think it would suffer by having the combat and exploration separate.
Actually, it kinda works. I fully intended to work this idea on a RBY remake on GSC's engine.
The thing is: you need field moves. Not necessarily HMs, but the ability to interact with the overworld, which is something I've been missing a lot in new games.
Something that also needs to be implemented for that to work is the ability to fail puzzles and need to reset them. This actually was common with Strength puzzles. But HMs like Cut, Rock Smash, Whirlpool and Waterfall are literally simple roadblocks.
Being able to use field moves to open shortcuts would help to establish that Metroidvania feel too.
Pokémon already has distinct combat and exploration phases in gameplay, but the exploration just keeps getting worse and worse with each game. And you don't need an open-world for that. Past Pokémon games were always linear. (With the exception of Kanto and Johto, I'll be getting into those in a bit.) You need dungeons. You need cities that are actually worth exploring instead of "lol Iki Town".
A good example of this happened in BW. You could just make a beeline for Nimbasa after you were done with Castelia or you could actually explore the desert and be heavily rewarded for it. All you knew was: "Nimbasa is the next city you need to visit." The path was open for you to decide how to tackle it.
Now going back to RBY, GSC and my actual unpopular opinion...
Kanto and Johto having some open elements are pointless at best (RBY) and harmful at worst. (GSC)
Think about it. You can just outright skip a lot of gyms, especially Lt. Surge. That's good, right?
No. The levels don't scale. Why bother? The only possible advantage is sequence-breaking to get a couple of mons, but most of the time, it's neither necessary nor particularly rewarding. Delaying a gym only trivializes it in the long run, especially Surge's.
GSC makes it even worse since the lack of scaling utterly breaks the level curve. There are somewhat better rewards, especially in HGSS where the Red Gyarados isn't trash, but the collateral damage isn't worth it, again, because the leaders don't scale their teams to match the number of badges you have.
A linear experience would benefit these games a lot more, especially because there are rewards for exploration even if you follow the canon path, but I'd rather have Gyms scale their levels based on how many badges the player has.
The Wild Area might actually be a good step in that direction if they want to explore the idea of an open-world Pokémon game, but that's looking too far forward and I don't think Game Freak as is has the ambition and skill to pull it off.
So I finally read Yung Dramps's USUM post. I agree with most of it, despite not knowing how one could possibly enjoy Alola without wanting to sic the ultimate weapon on Melemele.
Maybe I should've played SM instead of USUM, but Mantine Surf and early tutors were too attractive to pass up.
In case I haven’t made it crystal clear by now: HARDER. DOES. NOT. EQUAL. BETTER. If people are legitimately so desperate for a “truly difficult” fight (which imo this series has already produced on multiple occasions, including in Gen 7 itself, without having to resort to such absurd lengths), then WHY ARE YOU PLAYING POKEMON?!
The first, and frankly obvious, is that we know how good a battle can be because we've all played a multiplayer match at some point. The problem is, the In-Game battles do not deliver that experience. Or more accurately, they don't anymore. Not until the post-game.
The second, difficulty and quality are not inherently opposed concepts. Take GSC Jasmine for example. Let's ignore for a second that her "Gym" was absolutely pathetic. She was the Gym Leader for that new, mysterious Steel-type and at least the 6th Gym you're facing.
What is her team? 2 Magnemites (No joke, they got TBolt. Can't sleep on 'em) and a Steelix.
Now, let's take a look at what her team conveys, and what it could be.
The first thing you'll notice is that the Mags immediately allude to their changed type, which is a nice touch. They also stop Feraligatr from trying to sweep unless it outspeeds them and has Dig.
But think about it. Wouldn't it be better if she showcased more of those brand-new Steel-types, especially some you don't have access to yet? She is a late-game Leader, so we can up the challenge a bit as well.
How about this: Scizor (Agility + Baton Pass), Magneton and Steelix.
That's not even a low-quality Rom Hack-tier team, it's just a slight rework of her team that could even keep the same levels, no need for random spikes. It keeps Steelix as her ace, it keeps the reminder that Magnemite and Magneton got re-typed and adds the point of cross-gen evos with Scizor.
Do you know what are hack-like bosses? The totems. I despise the totems as bosses because instead of using strategy, they vault straight into the fake difficulty territory in a deranged attempt of keeping up with the player's advantages in an arms race-like scenario.
Ultra Necrozma is quite literally a shining example of how artificial and poorly-designed the difficulty is. A massive level spike and that silly aura. Compare that to actual strategy like XY Viola's Surskit using Water Sport so Fennekin doesn't torch her whole Gym. It's atrocious. And it's not even the hardest battle in the game, Totem Mimikyu is. In no small part because of the synergy with its partner and the actual strategy behind it, but sadly, it's marred by the Alolan Totems fake difficulty.
People ask for more difficult battles, but not in a fake way like Alola and Rom Hacks do. They want to actually strategize and see opponents that aren't absolutely pathetic to beat.
GF keeps pandering to all those fans that have been playing since RBY and insulting their intelligence with things like Bea not using her Machamp's G-Max Move because her AI is so abysmal that it apparently can't use it. The games keep getting worse and more poorly designed, the outcry for the poor difficulty is just a side-effect of that.
Edit: As I posted, I noticed that it came out as a double post. Sorry about that, when I was typing this in another tab the message saying new posts happened was showing up, so it was a legit mistake. It won't happen again.
RE: Giovanni: In our Ultra Moon hack, we did something to make his motivations closer to his usual motivations. Him just focusing on UBs in the original was kind of off to me and didn't feel fully like Giovanni. But what did we do with him? You'll have to follow my Let's Play of the hack to find out. :)
Also, we did something with Lysandre, but again, you'll have to follow along!
Might be a bit of a hot take, but I'll shoot it anyway.
I don't like how Giovanni always seems to relapse into villainy, and that's a problem I got with HGSS as well, not just USUM.
In RBY, he disbands Team Rocket and devotes himself to training to face Red again. The implication is that Giovanni recognizes he was utterly defeated and goes back to the drawing board.
GSC reinforces that Giovanni actually reformed because despite the Johto's branch taking over the Radio Tower to call him, (and HGSS confirms that he heard that call) the former boss just leaves them hanging.
Then HGSS comes in and says "Nope, evil all along. Silver needs it to be more edgy."
I can stomach USUM's idea because it's an alternate universe where all villains actually won, so Giovanni's arc is significantly different. But not HGSS's retcon.
Might be a bit of a hot take, but I'll shoot it anyway.
I don't like how Giovanni always seems to relapse into villainy, and that's a problem I got with HGSS as well, not just USUM.
In RBY, he disbands Team Rocket and devotes himself to training to face Red again. The implication is that Giovanni recognizes he was utterly defeated and goes back to the drawing board.
GSC reinforces that Giovanni actually reformed because despite the Johto's branch taking over the Radio Tower to call him, (and HGSS confirms that he heard that call) the former boss just leaves them hanging.
Then HGSS comes in and says "Nope, evil all along. Silver needs it to be more edgy."
I can stomach USUM's idea because it's an alternate universe where all villains actually won, so Giovanni's arc is significantly different. But not HGSS's retcon.
Forgot about that. It's been a while. My point still stands because that was after the HGSS retcon.
It honestly comes off as just a reason to keep reusing Giovanni as an enemy for that good old Kanto nostalgia pandering, which is further exemplified by USUM bringing that Team Rainbow Rocket out of nowhere.
I always interpreted the cutscene between Giovanni and Silver as occurring before Red defeats him. However I also think that he would have answered in HGSS under normal circumstances. Not necessarily because I think he's eager to return to crime, but because he's grown to the point where he no longer thinks of his less-than-competent followers (i.e. the entire Johto Team Rocket) as expendable. Of course, out of nowhere, somebody who fights just like Red did shows up and beats him again, as if to tell him that his thoughts of his grunts are just an excuse for going back to his power-hungry ways. As for BW2, I like to think he was so close to succeeding in going fully legit, until Ghetsis shakes up his worldview once again. Sure, team Plasma eventually failed, but it showed that someone can grab and hold power while being Evil. Instead of looking to be better than Red and Lyra/Ethan as a legitimate trainer, he starts looking to be better than Ghetsis as a crimelord.
In terms of personal preference, I like that he actually struggles with his motivation as a villain (being the greatest), rather than being irredeemably Evil like Ghetsis or Lysandre or misguided like pretty much every other villian. But then, I only played a 'pre-retcon' game after HGSS.
So I finally read Yung Dramps's USUM post. I agree with most of it, despite not knowing how one could possibly enjoy Alola without wanting to sic the ultimate weapon on Melemele.
Maybe I should've played SM instead of USUM, but Mantine Surf and early tutors were too attractive to pass up.
I have several issues with that statement.
The first, and frankly obvious, is that we know how good a battle can be because we've all played a multiplayer match at some point. The problem is, the In-Game battles do not deliver that experience. Or more accurately, they don't anymore. Not until the post-game.
The second, difficulty and quality are not inherently opposed concepts. Take GSC Jasmine for example. Let's ignore for a second that her "Gym" was absolutely pathetic. She was the Gym Leader for that new, mysterious Steel-type and at least the 6th Gym you're facing.
What is her team? 2 Magnemites (No joke, they got TBolt. Can't sleep on 'em) and a Steelix.
Now, let's take a look at what her team conveys, and what it could be.
The first thing you'll notice is that the Mags immediately allude to their changed type, which is a nice touch. They also stop Feraligatr from trying to sweep unless it outspeeds them and has Dig.
But think about it. Wouldn't it be better if she showcased more of those brand-new Steel-types, especially some you don't have access to yet? She is a late-game Leader, so we can up the challenge a bit as well.
How about this: Scizor (Agility + Baton Pass), Magneton and Steelix.
That's not even a low-quality Rom Hack-tier team, it's just a slight rework of her team that could even keep the same levels, no need for random spikes. It keeps Steelix as her ace, it keeps the reminder that Magnemite and Magneton got re-typed and adds the point of cross-gen evos with Scizor.
Do you know what are hack-like bosses? The totems. I despise the totems as bosses because instead of using strategy, they vault straight into the fake difficulty territory in a deranged attempt of keeping up with the player's advantages in an arms race-like scenario.
Ultra Necrozma is quite literally a shining example of how artificial and poorly-designed the difficulty is. A massive level spike and that silly aura. Compare that to actual strategy like XY Viola's Surskit using Water Sport so Fennekin doesn't torch her whole Gym. It's atrocious. And it's not even the hardest battle in the game, Totem Mimikyu is. In no small part because of the synergy with its partner and the actual strategy behind it, but sadly, it's marred by the Alolan Totems fake difficulty.
People ask for more difficult battles, but not in a fake way like Alola and Rom Hacks do. They want to actually strategize and see opponents that aren't absolutely pathetic to beat.
GF keeps pandering to all those fans that have been playing since RBY and insulting their intelligence with things like Bea not using her Machamp's G-Max Move because her AI is so abysmal that it apparently can't use it. The games keep getting worse and more poorly designed, the outcry for the poor difficulty is just a side-effect of that.
Edit: As I posted, I noticed that it came out as a double post. Sorry about that, when I was typing this in another tab the message saying new posts happened was showing up, so it was a legit mistake. It won't happen again.
Hmm...
Okay, I hear you, and I see the title of the thread, and I respect your opinion and your bravery in sharing it...
but I really really really want to debate this, and to be honest I get the impression that mine is a suitably unpopular opinion as well, so I hope it's alright if I go for it anyway.
Here's why I think Totem Pokémon are some of the best bosses in the series!
First of all, let's clear up a common misconception: that Totem Pokémon's auras and SOS partners are a case of "fake difficulty" used to make them harder than they should be and generally unfair, esp. at the expense of a properly thought out or intelligent strategy.
To start, we'll define "fake difficulty." Fake difficulty is when the game puts you at a disadvantage because it does not want you to win; it's when it tries to pad out its length by being so brutal and punishing that it takes forever to beat no matter what you do and has no clear weaknesses. Fake difficulty is when the game throws unreasonably high levels at the player with the intention that they'll have to overcome it by grinding - or with the intention that it'll compensate for a total lack of any other strategy on the game's own part, when the game brute-forces you.
"Fake difficulty" is not when a game uses asymmetric boss design to challenge players more than a perfectly even playing field would allow - let alone in a way that still also uses existing game mechanics creatively, comes with clearly defined solutions, never leaves a player helpless and unable to do anything... and still leaves opportunities to win with carefully placed cheese tactics or brute force if that's still just not accessible enough. Fake difficulty is also not when an enemy has exactly the stats it needs to pull off exactly the strategy it wants in a way that facilitates exactly the kind of interaction I've just described and no more.
Fake difficulty is when you ask "what am I supposed to do?!" in incredulity because you don't believe the developer even had a reasonable solution in mind; real difficulty is when you ask "what am I supposed to do?" because there's a completely fair solution somewhere and you just need to puzzle out what it is.
I mentioned asymmetric boss design above. What's that?
Well, Totem Pokémon are not designed to cheat - they're designed to have different strengths AND weaknesses relative to the player. While the mechanics of the battle give various advantages to the Totem Pokémon, players (and even, in some cases, many regular NPC Trainers!) have their own advantages that no Totem Pokémon ever does:
- If the Totem knocks out whatever the player is using, they can always send out another Pokémon. How is this an advantage? Well, for comparison, if the player beats the Totem itself, they instantly cut off the rest of its allies as well. It can't call for help after it's knocked out even if it has more allies in reserve.
- The Totem Pokémon may fight with two Pokémon at once, but there are limitations on this: unlike regular SOS battles (which are infinite), they only have two allies at all, while the player can bring six Pokémon. Also, they can only call for their second ally after taking a certain amount of damage, separating the fight into "phases;" if the player is struggling to overcome the beginning stages of the Totem Pokémon, it's designed to give them a breather and turn into a one-on-one fight for a time so they have a chance to get their own strategy into place.
- The Totem's ally Pokémon, being wild Pokémon, are also quite weak. Unlike the player (yes, you do get EVs even if you aren't actively training a specific stat) and boss Trainers in Gen VII, ally Pokémon have straight 0s in all of their stats, so they tend to be much weaker than the player's team, let alone any serious enemies. They also have lower levels than the Totem and no auras, and most of them prioritize status moves and disruptive moves rather than raw damage, which greatly mitigates the apparent "ganging up" and snowball effect that one would expect of a two-on-one battle.
- Unlike even regular NPC bosses (let alone the player!), Totem Pokémon cannot switch out, meaning they have absolutely no way to clear stat debuffs or volatile status conditions. Every Totem Pokémon is also vulnerable to non-volatile status conditions... arguably except Mimikyu, but even that only has a single Lum Berry and is no less vulnerable after that.
- The player has a bag. That's way freer use of healing than any Totem, plus the completely broken nonsense that is X-Items. For that matter, X-Items were buffed specifically in this Generation, seemingly specifically for this reason.
- The player has Z-Moves. Totem Pokémon obviously do not. That's a massive amount of damage they can do before the Totem even calls its first ally, and by virtue of being mostly single-Pokémon bosses, Totem Pokémon are more vulnerable to these than any other boss in the game. With the exception of the first Totem Pokémon and Wishiwashi, the player also never fights a Totem Pokémon without access to a Z-Crystal that's super effective against it. You haven't made this argument, and I trust you weren't planning on it, but I've seen it argued before and just want to establish my stance anyway:
If you swear off those advantages for the sake of a self-imposed challenge... well, first of all, that's not the game's fault - if you're going out of your way to handicap yourself to raise the difficulty level, you're supposed to be at a disadvantage. You are literally doing that to yourself... on purpose. Not even as a side effect of something else - as your main objective.
More importantly, I would argue: if the game doesn't make itself easier to "accommodate" for you... because you're trying to make the game harder, both you and the game are doing something right. I, for one, am sincerely glad it's not Sword and Shield, which all but refuse to let anyone modulate their own difficulty.
For that matter, I also played the entirety of Ultra Sun mostly blind, without in-battle bag use and without using a single Z-Move, and I always made sure to fight both allies for the sake of completion, meaning they also generally got to use their full strategies... but I still never felt helpless or thought that the Totem Pokémon were unfair, so I find it hard to believe that even avoiding those things could make them this frustrating for someone else?
also Totem Mimikyu was one of the easiest ones what are you even talking about
are you one of those people who tried to oneshot it with a turn-one Z-Move and then got mad when it didn't work? because that's literally the only complaint I've heard anyone else make about it and I'm really sorry but I cannot take it seriously
But anyway, the mere mechanics of the battle - whether they favor the player or the Totem - aren't enough to decide whether the Totems are "fair" or "unfair," nor whether they're "fake" or "strategic," all on their own. We also have to look at the specifics of each fight!
What I personally consider to be "fair" and "strategic" is as follows:
- There is always something the player can do, no matter their team; the player's Pokémon should never be completely unable to act for the entire battle, because that completely undermines any room for creative strategies or counterplay to be executed. For example, the boss leaves openings for attacks under the right circumstances, and taking advantage of these openings gives players the opportunities to set up their own strategies.
- The boss is equipped to cover some of its weaknesses (that's just basic strategy! if the player can sweep the boss with just one Pokémon with a type advantage, and that turns out to be the only factor that comes into play, that's an extremely poorly designed fight!), but it also leaves some clearly defined counterplay intact so there's some way to take advantage of it.
Given this lens, here's a detailed rundown of a Totem Pokémon:
Totem Araquanid
The gimmick of the battle is that Araquanid is an extremely slow Pokémon, and they're trying to make it fast by using speed control.
The "strategy" comes in through its allies, which make effective use of moves like Sticky Web, Scary Face, Stun Spore and Tailwind to stack Speed advantages until Araquanid can "sweep," but you have a bare minimum of two turns to attack before they set up.
This boss is the definition of a tank: it hits hard, but it's also very slow and you can generally secure a hit on it almost every turn. Its allies use strategy to help with that vulnerability - in a way that teaches the player about mechanics that almost no other games bother to give to NPCs! seriously, how often do you see Sticky Web or Tailwind used? - but not in a way that doesn't leave an opening for the player to attack, not if you beat Araquanid before they set up and not if you beat the allies before they set up.
Araquanid is equipped to deal with the common weaknesses of the Water type (and the Bug type, because this is really a Bug Trial anyway) to the extent that it won't be cleanly swept with just a type advantage - which is a good thing, because it means just about every team has a fair chance at beating it, just like your example of Viola is designed to mitigate the effects of Fennekin's advantage.
I would argue that this battle is actually designed to force you to engage with the speed control side as much as possible: Araquanid has offensive counterplay to its main weaknesses, but it's also naturally slower than all of them. If you go first, the game allows all of them to attack at a higher power than most Pokémon; however, it also allows Araquanid to hit them back at a higher power, so it becomes a) difficult to solo the fight with only one Pokémon (and that's a good thing) and b) important to maintain your Speed advantage and not let Araquanid start to go first.
I know what you're about to say - "Wait, naturally slower? No, they cheated and gave it a Speed-boosting aura! That doesn't count!"
Here's the thing.
Araquanid has base 42 Speed. Totem Araquanid is fixed to have an IV of 1 in Speed, no EVs and a Speed-neutral nature (Bold). That means, from the start of the battle, even with its "cheating" +1 Speed aura, and even if you're somehow unlucky enough to have 0 IVs and no EVs on all of your Pokémon at this point (which you won't), it's still slower than all of the following Pokémon before it gets to set up, which guarantees you at least two free turns before you even have to worry about speed control:
- Litten/Torracat
- Pikipek/Trumbeak
- Alolan Rattata/Alolan Raticate
- Butterfree
- Ledian
- Buneary/Lopunny
- Zorua
- Furfrou
- Pikachu
- Wingull/Pelipper
- Abra/Kadabra/Alakazam
- Alolan Meowth/Alolan Persian
- Smeargle
- Gastly
- Drifloon
- Murkrow
- Alolan Diglett/Alolan Dugtrio
- Spearow
- Mankey
- Delibird
- Hawlucha
- Oricorio
- Cutiefly/Ribombee
- Cottonee
- Smoochum
- Magikarp (yes, you can leave after you get Lapras Paddle)
- Tentacool (same)
- Finneon (same)
- Luvdisc (same)
- Remoraid (same)
- Mantine (also Mantyke if it's Swift Swim, so 50/50, but yes you can have an evolved Mantine by now)
- Salamence (SOS)
- Espeon/Umbreon
- Tauros
- Miltank
- Surskit/Masquerain
- There are also Poliwag, Goldeen, Basculin, Feebas and Alomomola, but I'm not sure if they can be caught before Araquanid in USUM.
And there are even more if you have anything better than the worst possible luck with stats (remember, I'm specifically excluding any IVs and EVs on your Pokémon - about two thirds of, say, Rockruff can also naturally outspeed, but there's the off chance that you roll an IV of less than 11 or a bad nature, so I'm not even going to assume that).
There's also a hard cap on how much Araquanid's allies can set up before you accomplish anything: Masquerain, which can give it a Speed advantage over every Pokémon, only shows up if you've already significantly damaged Araquanid, and it's much more likely to call Dewpider first. Unlike Masquerain, Dewpider has only one form of speed control - Sticky Web, which doesn't affect the Pokémon that's currently on the field, induces a smaller modifier than Masquerain's moves, and doesn't work on Flying-types.
Flying-types in general are clearly being pushed as the "easy way out" in this fight - not because of some basic assumption that "Flying-types sweep Bug-types" but because they nullify its strategy.
Of course, you also have access to Flyinium-Z at this point in USUM (which is especially notable because you didn't in Sun and Moon - they specifically made it available because of Totem Araquanid).
The thing I like about this is that Araquanid still isn't completely helpless against them - they have a big advantage not only in type but in the way their innate characteristics circumvent Araquanid's main strategy, but using just one Flying-type probably still isn't a win button. Ideally, your strategy has you weakening Araquanid with your other Pokémon before Dewpider sets up Sticky Web, then sending in a Flying-type to finish it off after it does, making for an interesting battle that isn't just carried to victory by one single Pokémon and gives your whole team a chance to contribute, while your Flying-type only really has a distinct advantage several turns into the fight, after the boss gets its strategy working and becomes prepared to punish every other switch-in, as a last resort to get around said strategy and finish it off.
You don't even need a Flying-type - I want to emphasize that that's the "backup plan for anyone who really needs help," not the only solution. I beat this fight with a team of... either Litten or Torracat, Rockruff and Dewpider, with absolutely no grinding and a level disadvantage. (Note the obvious type disadvantage, too!) No Flying-types. No Flying-type moves. As mentioned, no Z-Moves or in-battle item use, either. It took a few tries, sure, but there was no point at which even I felt it was unbeatable or unfair despite my hilariously un-stacked team for that point in the game.
Honestly, I think I had a harder time with the perfectly even fight against Hala -- and that was obviously the fault of my team composition at that point I picked which Pokémon I wanted to use before I started and did not take availability into account, so... well, same team minus Dewpider, haha, but my point is that Totem Pokémon aren't inherently harder than any other battle in the game, because they don't abuse their advantages in a way that's as cheap as they look.
Yes, if you let Araquanid's allies set up all the way before you accomplish anything, you're going to get swept - and if you also don't pay enough attention to its strategy to try to play around it the second time, you're going to get swept again. This much is true of almost every challenging boss in the series.
Just think of it like Whitney's Miltank - Miltank is fast (certainly much, much more so than Totem Araquanid - Araquanid at +1 against a target that's been affected by Sticky Web is still slower than Whitney's Miltank), bulky enough that it has time to gain momentum, and hard-hitting enough to abuse that momentum (Rollout). For that matter, Whitney's Miltank also abuses Attract and flinchhax, which is way more disruptive (read: gives fewer opportunities for the player to attack and leaves less room for creative strategies accordingly) and also way more luck-based and less fun to face than speed control.
Anyway, the fact that a boss like this relies on setup and momentum to do anything resembling a "sweep" absolutely gives you fair opportunities to beat it, and the fact that that an entire typeautomatically comes with both an immunity to its only instantaneous form of speed control and a "super move" that can heavily damage it (and it's a popular type for teams and a common early-game type at that) gives perfect disruptive and offensive counterplay to its strategy that's still accessible to a wide variety of Pokémon available by this point if you even need to use them.
This is literally a perfect boss battle - I don't understand how this kind of thing could be mistaken for "fake difficulty." I also plan to follow up on this with a (shorter) rundown of every Totem Pokémon and how they work to the same standards, but this is getting long as it is, so I'll stop here for now.
Totem Pokémon are some of the best bosses in the series for their puzzle-like approach; they're carefully balanced to challenge players and create interesting strategies on both sides, but they're not even close to insurmountable and it's abundantly clear that the developers carefully considered how to make them beatable for every player. That's the opposite of fake difficulty - it's downright fantastic game design and boss design.
I don't think designing them this way with their own mechanics and advantages is the only way this could have been done (although I have to be honest and say that I don't think many other bosses in the series do it anywhere near as well), but it's by no means a wrong way to do it. Also, what other game series do you even play where "bosses" don't have any mechanics or stat differences setting them apart from regular opponents.
I don't think of the totems as all that well-designed compared to what could be done with a Gym Leader. A lot of this is because I have a tendancy to value damage-over-time effects highly. There is only totem in each game that cannot be trivialized with alolan grimer/muk (okay, you need to live a second turn to re-apply poison on Gumshoos/Raticate and mimikyu), and it's for reasons completely unrelated to their main strategy (i.e. nothing sallazzle or togedemaru does atcually relies on their immunity to poison). It's not like you can't make a player-rules team that uses strong speed control or various doubles strategies. You can still show off whatever you can show off with a totem normally, while avoiding the status-related problems that a 1v1 provides. One of the biggest examples I can see of the issues is Ultra Necrozma. It hits hard, that is the sum total of its strategy. You can argue, not without cause, that it hits unreasonably hard. But it needs to. The threat of OHKOing everything you have is required for it to have any sense of challenge, because only having one health bar is so crippling that if the player ever gets a move off, they win. Totems at least have reinforcements, though none of them stock status curing because doing so would reduce their ability to use their intended strategy with their limited options. Which ironically makes those strategies irrelevant.
Status against bosses is something a lot of RPGs struggle with. Even if Your DoT isn't percentage-based like pokemon, there are still ways to cripple a single opponent. I personally find it really clumsy to just render the boss immune to what you're worried about (hello, Max Raids), so it annoys me that pokemon has already had a workable solution and just stopped using it. Stall is both usable and counterable in situations with multiple pokemon on both sides, but becomes unmanageable in an asymmetric context.
Bottom line: the Totems may be better than contemporary NPC teams, but that is an indication that the NPCs are not up to standard, not that Totems are inherently a good idea (because I think they're a step backwards compared to Gym Leaders)
So I finally read Yung Dramps's USUM post. I agree with most of it, despite not knowing how one could possibly enjoy Alola without wanting to sic the ultimate weapon on Melemele.
Maybe I should've played SM instead of USUM, but Mantine Surf and early tutors were too attractive to pass up.
I have several issues with that statement.
The first, and frankly obvious, is that we know how good a battle can be because we've all played a multiplayer match at some point. The problem is, the In-Game battles do not deliver that experience. Or more accurately, they don't anymore. Not until the post-game.
The second, difficulty and quality are not inherently opposed concepts. Take GSC Jasmine for example. Let's ignore for a second that her "Gym" was absolutely pathetic. She was the Gym Leader for that new, mysterious Steel-type and at least the 6th Gym you're facing.
What is her team? 2 Magnemites (No joke, they got TBolt. Can't sleep on 'em) and a Steelix.
Now, let's take a look at what her team conveys, and what it could be.
The first thing you'll notice is that the Mags immediately allude to their changed type, which is a nice touch. They also stop Feraligatr from trying to sweep unless it outspeeds them and has Dig.
But think about it. Wouldn't it be better if she showcased more of those brand-new Steel-types, especially some you don't have access to yet? She is a late-game Leader, so we can up the challenge a bit as well.
How about this: Scizor (Agility + Baton Pass), Magneton and Steelix.
That's not even a low-quality Rom Hack-tier team, it's just a slight rework of her team that could even keep the same levels, no need for random spikes. It keeps Steelix as her ace, it keeps the reminder that Magnemite and Magneton got re-typed and adds the point of cross-gen evos with Scizor.
Do you know what are hack-like bosses? The totems. I despise the totems as bosses because instead of using strategy, they vault straight into the fake difficulty territory in a deranged attempt of keeping up with the player's advantages in an arms race-like scenario.
Ultra Necrozma is quite literally a shining example of how artificial and poorly-designed the difficulty is. A massive level spike and that silly aura. Compare that to actual strategy like XY Viola's Surskit using Water Sport so Fennekin doesn't torch her whole Gym. It's atrocious. And it's not even the hardest battle in the game, Totem Mimikyu is. In no small part because of the synergy with its partner and the actual strategy behind it, but sadly, it's marred by the Alolan Totems fake difficulty.
People ask for more difficult battles, but not in a fake way like Alola and Rom Hacks do. They want to actually strategize and see opponents that aren't absolutely pathetic to beat.
GF keeps pandering to all those fans that have been playing since RBY and insulting their intelligence with things like Bea not using her Machamp's G-Max Move because her AI is so abysmal that it apparently can't use it. The games keep getting worse and more poorly designed, the outcry for the poor difficulty is just a side-effect of that.
Edit: As I posted, I noticed that it came out as a double post. Sorry about that, when I was typing this in another tab the message saying new posts happened was showing up, so it was a legit mistake. It won't happen again.
I would've loved to respond the moment I liked this comment but it was literally 1 AM and I had to go to bed. I was also gonna explain why I don't think Totems are fake difficulty but based Hematite beat me to the punch and provided a far more detailed explanation than I ever could. I guess all I can really add to that is how Ultra Necrozma throws all that away by not having a strategy and getting too absurd with the buffs, but I already explained that in the OP.
As for the other thing, here's another hot(?) take: On the whole I actually think SWSH has probably the best Gym Leaders in the series. The only one who's kinda bleh is Milo, but after he's donewith it just keeps getting better and better. One of the stand-out examples to me is Kabu, who they did not pull ANY punches with. 3 fully-evolved Pokemon including Arcanine and Centiskorch at the mid-to-late 20s where you may still have first stage Pokemon on your team is straight up nasty, especially since the Ninetales and Arcanine are designed to cripple physical attackers in their own ways, the former using speedy Will-O-Wisps, the latter having Intimidate and Will-O-Wisp as well, and then it of course builds up to GMax Centiskorch who even after the 3-turn period is done can fuck you up with Coil of all things, which is, again, an insane move for this point in the game. Now I had the misfortune of picking Grookey, so it might be a lot easier for Sobble or even Scorbunny users, but still to me this battle is like if Fantina in Platinum had all three of her Pokemon at roughly the same power level as her Mismagius. He's not a one-off, possibly accidentally good boss amidst a pile of trash either like Viola in XY, Bea/Allister, Opal, Piers and Raihan are really dope too. It's also worth noting SWSH is the earliest game to have 4-Pokemon gym fights starting at Gym #4 with Bea or Allister.
Yung Dramps:
Sorry took a while to respond to your post, it was big so I left it for the weekend. Not going to respond to everything, obviously, but I do want to quickly first say this is a well put together overview of the issues with USUM that many people have had and I agree with most of the points (and ones I don't are minor points).
Now onto some of the things I wanted to respond to:
Pikachu Valley: As you said, waste of time and shameless shrine to the series mascot. Heck, even if you brought your own Pikachu there's nothing for it. They could have maybe thrown in a Pikachu family move Tutor that taught Pikachu all the Egg Moves it could get (aybe throw in a reference to Cosplay Pikachu by letting your Pikachu learn its exclusive moves). However the dumbest part of the whole place is the trailer Pikachu run out of.
They could have maybe used it for a mini-game, but instead you just watch as Pikachu run out of it. They keep count so of course you're curious what happens when you get to 1k Pikachu. The answer? NOTHING! Yeah, sure, it was my choice to do so with no prompt I would get something, but if you're going to keep count I kind of expect some pay off aside the guy being impressed I watched that many Pikachu run out of the trailer.
Another idea, post game give the player a Shiny Pichu Egg. Actually, that's another thing which bothers me about the Pikachu Valley is it kind of feels unbelievable. Okay, fine, I can understand there being no Raichu (though once again would have been nice if we did and they're just keeping watch or something, acting as guards), but you're telling me with ALL of these Pikachu around there's not one Pichu? Not even a Pichu Egg? All these Pikachu are platonic friends? Heck, I'd also throw in some of the other Pikaclones just for variety sake. As long as most of the residents are Pikachu you can call it Pikachu Valley.
The Kantonian Gym: The biggest disappointment for me was that it was such an obvious place for a cameo. Just have Lt. Surge one day be in the Gym, not as a Gym Leader, just as one of the normal trainers as he's amused with the inaccurate recreation. Not only that they could have him remember your character was the one he gave an autograph to.
Also, if the Badge isn't going to do anything, don't give me the Badge. What's the point? Just have him give like Pearls or Big Pearls (since Vermillion is a port city the "Gym Leader" could say he collected a lot of pearls when he was over at Vermillion so giving them out as a reward in replacement for a Badge).
The Ultra Space Locations: Not even going to bother mentioning Ultra Megalopolis as there's nothing more to say (we don't even see another resident aside from the Ultra Recon Squad members). But I do want to touch on something you said: that you'd rather do the Looker missions again. And, yeah, why didn't they add onto the Looker missions instead of chopping it? Have Looker asks the player to help fight off the Ultra Beast as he did in the original game, but instead of catching them (you'd be forced to knock them out) they'd run back through an Ultra Wormhole. While that would finish the Looker mission, you could then go to the Ultra Recon Squad and they could help send you to the Ultra Beast's home world. And while I would have liked if the areas were as big as any other dungeon in the game, I think doing this would have been understandable why the area was small.
As for the other Legendaries, specific environments where you originally battled them would have been nice but if that couldn't done would have preferred if I was just teleported to a random place in Alola where the battle takes place:
Articuno at the peak of Mount Lanakila.
Zapdos inside Blush Mountain's Geothermal Power Plant.
Moltres at the top of Wela Volcano Park.
Mewtwo in Resolution Cave.
Raikou/Entei in Lush Jungle.
Suicune in Brooklet Hill
Lugia/Ho-Oh in Maile Garden.
Regirock outside the Ruins of Abundance.
Regice in Mount Lanakila's Icy Caves.
Registeel in Thrifty Megamart (Abandoned Site).
Latias/Latios on Exeggutor Island.
Kyogre/Groudon on Poni Breaker Coast.
Rayquaza at the Altar of the Sunne/Moone.
Uxie outside Maile City's library.
Mesprit in Memorial Hill.
Azelf outside Royal Avenue's Battle Royal Dome.
Dialga/Palkia at the peak of Mount Hokulani.
Heatran in Diglett's Tunnel.
Regigigas in Aether Paradise.
Giratina in Hau'oli Cemetery.
Cresselia in front of Po Town's Shady House.
Cabalion in Poni Gauntlet.
Terrakion in Ten Carat Hill.
Virizion in Verdant Cavern.
Tornadus/Thundurus at
Landorus in Berry Fields.
Reshiram/Zekrom at the Lake of the Moone/Sunne.
Kyruem in Plains Grotto.
Xerneas/Yveltal outside the Ruins of Life.
Mina's Trial: Now I like that they gave Mina a Trial and don't mind the way they did it. Does it bog the game down, maybe a bit? But I more looked at it like it was a victory lap then them stretching gameplay time out.
Ultra Warp Ride: I've said it before and I'll say it again, they added one or two too many mechanics. Get rid of the electric orbs which slow you down & get rid of the warp hole tiers and I think it would have been much better (also let us start with analog control with the option to use motion controls).
Rainbow Rocket: I wished it wasn't kept to the confines of Aether Paradise.
Like after seeing what unfolds on TV and to the Aether Paradise you're contacted by Wicke who tells you she's trapped in Aether Paradise but she contacted someone at the Aether Foundation building on Route 8 to help you free them. You go to Route 8 and meetup with Colress who explains before going to the Aether Paradise there was other similar signtures appearing around Alola and those should be investigated. When you get there you'll team up with some NPCs and battle a few Rocket grunts causing trouble nearby. After that you then meet the villain leaders and what they're doing where they are: Archie was sent to Seafolk Village to get boats to cause sea travel disruptions (Hapu & Mina help the player), Maxie sent to Wela Volcano Park to gather energy from the volcano (Kiawe & Olivia help the player), Cyrus sent to Hokulani Observatory to create communication interference (Sophocles, Molayne & Acerola help the player), Ghetsis sent to Shady House to try and recruit Guzma and Team Skull (Plumeria & Nanu help the player), and Lysandre sent to Heahea City to steal the Dimensional Research Lab's technology and research (Mallow, Lana, & Kahili helping the player). The villains would have a quick interaction with the player before being teleported back Aether Paradise. Colress then contacts you and tells you a new signal just appeared in Iki Town. Getting help from Hau, Hala, and Ilima with the Team Rocket grunts, you then meet Giovanni who wanted to meet the trainer that he heard was getting in his way and invites the player to the Aether Paradise before teleporting away. Before I move on, just so we have interactions between the villains, I think a fun thing to do would be, after foiling the plans of the first villain who just teleports away, after foiling the plan of the next villain the previous villain teleports in to recall them having a quick back & forth before both teleporting away.
This leads to arriving to the Aether Paradise (with Lillie & Colress, though Colress seemingly vanishes upon arriving) and you'll have to battle your way inside, getting a quick scene of Faba talking with the last villain who plans you foiled. They go inside Rocket Castle and you battle (and defeat) Faba who pretends he was being mind-controlled and lets you go inside Rocket Castle. Inside you'll see the first and last villains who plans you foiled talking with each other. The last one suddenly teleports away as Giovanni takes his place, him welcoming the player & friends and explainign if they want to rescue Lusamine they'll need to defeat all the villains. Giovanni would then have a quick interaction with the first villain you foil and both teleport away. It continues as it did in the games (except you can challenge the villains in any order, Ghetsis getting his own room) with Lillie staying in the main room to provide free healing & Guzma appearing later to provide his help. But just before you face the final villain you see they're talking with Lusamine. Lusamine teleports away and the battle and defeat the final villain. Note, whatever order you face Ghetsis, upon his defeat he'll reveal he's holding Wicke hostage but that's when Colress appears and reveals he's been following the player and teleporting the villains back to their home world once you defeated them; Wicke would then either go along with Colress (having her own invisibility suit, she was trying to sneak around when Ghetsis caught her) or go with the player to the main room if Ghetsis was the final villain.
With the final villan gone you go back to the main room to find Guzma knocked out and Lillie gone. Colress and Wicke join in as you wake up Guzma and he explains that Lusamine appeared to him and Lillie before sending out a strange Pokemon which knocked him out. Colress says Giovanni is in the basement and the player going in alone as Colress plans a way to restore Aether Paradise to normal and Wicke tends to Guzma's injuries. In the basement you find Giovanni, Lusamine, and a captured Lillie. Lillie tries warning the player something is wrong with Lusamine, a Nihilego then appearing from a wormhole and fusing with her to become the Mother Beast and you battle (and this time she also has a Nihilego she uses to battle with). Lusamine is defeated and she unfuses with the Nihilego, Giovanni dissapointed in the outcome and teleports Lusamine & Lillie away to have a 1-on-1 against the player. And with Giovanni defeated, he relents and turns Aether Paradise back to normal and teleports away himeself. Lillie and Lusamine were teleported to the main room where Colress, Wicke, and Guzma were as the player joins back with them to wrap up the story (don't worry about Lusamine, she wasn't fused with Nihilego so she just needs some antidote and a good night's sleep to fully recover). And of course we end with Giovanni looking on from outside the Aether Paradise, wondering which world he'll bring his evil to next before teleporing away.
Addressing your concern I put in little moments here and there for the villains to not only interact but let the player decide which villain interacts with who (thus giving it some replayability).
Lusamine's Team Switch:
No, that would be the one(s) who made that change.
Molayne Replaces Hala: My gripe at the pick was choosing Hala. There was a VERY important reason why Hala was an Elite Four member aside being a Kahuna: Hau. Hau's goal from the start was to beat his grandfather. In the original Sun & Moon, your first Title Defense is against Hau, which means he has accomplished his original goal! Sure, his new goal is beating you to become Champion, but at the very least you know while he may not defeat you he did defeat his longtime goal of wanting to beat Hala. Now in USUM, it's awesome it's Hau you fight for the Champion position first instead of Kukui, but with Hala no longer part of the Elite Four you have to be told by Hau he defeated his grandfather. Much like with it better to see Lillie talk back to Lusamine in SM then hearing it happened off-screen in USUM, the subtle realization of Hau's achievement felt better since it would have had to happen just before he challenge the player. In SM I can picture Hau leaving Hala the last Elite Four member to battle, and upon defeating him he then goes up to face the player. Awesome! In USUM, he defeats Hala probably in a private match and then has to go through Victory Road and the Elite Four before challenging the player. That feels less dramatic.
Ultra Recon Squad: I don't get it, WHAT WERE THEY THINKING?!
"Oh well they never battled before so they're not good at it"
THAT'S NOT A GOOD EXCUSE! They worked with Lusamine and the Aether Foundation long enough, they could have said they quickly learned that using MORE THAN ONE POKEMON was probably a good idea.
You battle them four times in the story. Here's an idea how to tell a story with them via their battles:
First Battle: Have it be a Double Battle (you know, because there is TWO of them) each having 4 Pokemon. However have each Pokemon be in a different kind of Poke Ball. This is to show that they're not only researching capturing and using Pokemon but also how the ball can have different effects, a subtle hint (or you can have them outright say it) that this is where they get the idea to make a special Poke Ball that capture Ultra Beasts. Second Battle: This can be a single battle against Dulse/Soliera. They use the same two Pokemon they had before but this time they have a third: Poipole in a Beast Ball. This shows they have made the Beast Balls, they successfully captured an Ultra Beast, and they have now just tested to see if an Ultra Beast will follow commands which it did. Third Battle: This is the battle where they're defending Aether Paradise. This is another Double Battle. This time each use 3 Pokemon each and while its revealed that Zossie/Phyco have also caught a Poipole in a Beast Ball, Dulse/Soliera reveal they evolved their Poipole into a Naganadel! Fourth Battle: Dulse/Soliera test you to see if you're worthy to use their Solgaleo/Lunala to Ultra Warp Ride. In addition to Naganadel and the two other Pokemon they had they added on two more Pokemon for a total of five. Fifth Battle (Post Game): Adding in a Fifth Battle cause it makes sense. Instead of them just thanking you for helping them, Zossie/Phyco challenge you to a single battle noting they've never battled you 1-on-1. They have evolved their Poipole into Naganadel and caught 3 more Pokemon giving them a full party of 6. Battle Tree: Finally, after the fifth battle you can challenge the two that are in your game in the Battle Tree.
No, I say they all for the most part give the kaiju feeling. But here's the issue with that: a lot of kaiju are just an animal made bigger. And note many kaiju are based on small animals, particularly bugs, which means we normally don't see the details these animals have with their face. Part of a shock with a kaiju is that we can now see all the details of the face and when they've been grown to 1000x their size it's terrifying. However the same can't be said when you do that with a Pokemon. Pokemon are not only cartoony but we can see all the details of their face and many Pokemon they chose to grow are already as big if not bigger then a human. The kaiju feeling gets lost as we're not really seeing any new details about them. Yes, some get new additions to their design so they don't look exactly like the base Pokemon but the additions aren't enough to make the Gmax Pokemon feel like they're, say, a new evolution step. This is why I kept on banging on about them tossing Mega Evos aside because Mega Evos, at least in their designs, is what I think people actually want: super forms of a Pokemon, a form that looks like it could be made into its own evolution stage. And let me add the disclaimer this isn't true for all Gmax Pokemon and Mega Evos, but on the whole I think this is the case.
While I see where you're coming from, I also don't want them to just completely stop making regions based off real world locations. I can sorta understand some frustration for people who live in a country/city that was made into a Pokemon game then seeing these environments that aren't in their in real life. I've would like to say/joke that I work in Unova, but I can't as there's no desert in the middle of Manhattan as there is in Unova.
HOWEVER, I can also understand why these changes are done: because if they weren't done the region would be tedious and same-y looking. Real life environment is kind of boring as its usually the same few types of terrain for miles, especially true for major cities. One thing I tell myself is that there's another reason we call Unova "Poke-New York", Kalos "Poke-France", and Galar "Poke-UK" aside being a joke. It's because it's not that these regions are those places put into the Pokemon world, rather the regions are those places Pokemon world equivalence. Pokemon takes place in a world where magical creatures that control the elements can be captures in a pocket-sized orb and bond together with humans to love, play, and work. Pokemon are seemingly as intelligent as an average person but are more instinctual, the wildlife environments are their home as cities & town are human's homes. And much like how humans would change things to adapt to them, I could see how people have both adapted and terraformed their environment to match their needs possibly resulting in strange environments in certain places (like random deserts, jungles, and arctic areas).
When they say Pokemon is based on a region, I actually think of it the way you suggested: they're taking this generic place with certain iconic locations and placing it in Pokemon. They'll likely keep the iconic locations, maybe even add in a few from other places they feel fit in or may need for justify having a certain Pokemon in the game, and then work from there mostly keeping the environments the same but then having some radical changes here and there to spice up the adventure. I say, don't look too hard at a region through a looking glass; instead of critiquing what it changed appreciate what they decided to include from that real world location.
... Though I will grant I can't help but feel anytime they include a Japanese-based feature they're either pandering to their home audience or doing so to make them feel more comfortable in the region.
Expanding on this thought, another gripe I have with the Ultra Space worlds is that we don't learn anything about them aside from what we see. Like what are the unique quality of this world that we either can't see or explains how it is as it is? Exactly how does the Ultra Beast exist in some of these places; how does it thrive, have adapted, the environment adapt to the UB?
BTW Poipole is from Ultra Megalopolis so we haven't seen Blacephalon's and Stakataka's home world. Though we do have concept art that was used for merch and from what I could tell Blacephalon is from someplace that is constantly shooting firework explosions up into the sky and Stakataka is from a forest world.
I already responded to this post earlier, but Imma make a 2nd response to quickly remark on something I forgot to earlier: The change from Hala to Molayne. And with that extra detail you mentioned about Hau... Oh my god. That makes the change SO MUCH WORSE!!! And this is the game where they even made Hau the first Champion fight... Look, I'm not going to say and I highly doubt that Game Freak intended to systemically tear the SM plot and its foundations to shreds for the shits and giggles, but with stuff like this and the treatment of Lillie it really freaking FEELS that way.
That's exactly how I see the Totems, hence why I compared their design to a "deranged Arms Race in which the Totems try to catch up with the player's advantages."
I don't have a problem with the asymmetrical boss design, I have a problem with the attempts to brute-forcing the player with asymmetrical designs and the aura boosts. Ultra Necc also further exemplifies that idea with a sudden level spike.
Fake difficulty is also not when an enemy has exactly the stats it needs to pull off exactly the strategy it wants in a way that facilitates exactly the kind of interaction I've just described and no more.
Agreed. Otherwise you can't have them actually strategize, to begin with. Using the "Viola's Surskit" example I mentioned in the earlier post, that Surskit was pretty fast so it could pull off that Water Sport before Fennekin could get started. That's good. I really have no problems with that.
also Totem Mimikyu was one of the easiest ones what are you even talking about
are you one of those people who tried to oneshot it with a turn-one Z-Move and then got mad when it didn't work? because that's literally the only complaint I've heard anyone else make about it and I'm really sorry but I cannot take it seriously
No, I already knew it had Disguise, so one-shotting it was out of the question. I actually tried to status it.
If you look at it though, it is a pretty tough battle. Besides not being able to just Z-Delete it, let's take a look at what Totem Mimi actually has.
It has a Lum Berry to make sure it can shrug off at least one Status attempt.
It has an omniboost, making it not only more threatening offensively, but also defensively.
It has STAB Shadow Claw to try and crit through the player's attempts to raise their mon's Defense. It has Leech Life for some healing attempts.
It has a guaranteed Will-o-Wisp Banette summon, which means that the player is hard-pressed to tank the boosted Mimi hits, the Burn chip damage, shrug off Screeches and even Curse in some cases. The Burn also cripples players trying to defeat Mimi with physical attackers.
This is all in the first phase. In terms of strategy, Totem Mimi has a well-thought-out, layered strategy that is honestly tough to keep up with, which is why I not only rank it as much more difficult than Ultra Necrozma, but also much better designed than Ultra Necrozma.
I know what you're about to say - "Wait, naturally slower? No, they cheated and gave it a Speed-boosting aura! That doesn't count!"
Here's the thing.
Araquanid has base 42 Speed. Totem Araquanid is fixed to have an IV of 1 in Speed, no EVs and a Speed-neutral nature (Bold).
Think about it. Look at all the weird things they had to make stat-wise to stop Totem Araquanid to brute-force through the player too hard.
GF is constantly trying to have their cake and eat it too design-wise. They both try to make these intricate, complex bosses but also try to pull their punches because kids gotta be able to beat these games. It's just messy.
I'll reinforce my point. The Totems are, in my opinion, bundles of fake difficulty because of their arms race-like approach to boss design. They just try to stack a bunch of advantages on gimped mons to compensate for the player's advantages instead of making well-developed bosses that illustrate how strategic Pokémon battles can be.
You can see some strategy on the totems, yes, I just described how thorough Totem Mimikyu is, but it's covered in a shell of 2v1 battles with innate stat boosts. And for what? They clearly had to hit the breaks on that idea and gimp the mons' stats or they would clearly brute-force their way through the player.
As for the other thing, here's another hot(?) take: On the whole I actually think SWSH has probably the best Gym Leaders in the series. The only one who's kinda bleh is Milo, but after he's donewith it just keeps getting better and better. One of the stand-out examples to me is Kabu, who they did not pull ANY punches with. 3 fully-evolved Pokemon including Arcanine and Centiskorch at the mid-to-late 20s where you may still have first stage Pokemon on your team is straight up nasty, especially since the Ninetales and Arcanine are designed to cripple physical attackers in their own ways, the former using speedy Will-O-Wisps, the latter having Intimidate and Will-O-Wisp as well, and then it of course builds up to GMax Centiskorch who even after the 3-turn period is done can fuck you up with Coil of all things, which is, again, an insane move for this point in the game. Now I had the misfortune of picking Grookey, so it might be a lot easier for Sobble or even Scorbunny users, but still to me this battle is like if Fantina in Platinum had all three of her Pokemon at roughly the same power level as her Mismagius. He's not a one-off, possibly accidentally good boss amidst a pile of trash either like Viola in XY, Bea/Allister, Opal, Piers and Raihan are really dope too. It's also worth noting SWSH is the earliest game to have 4-Pokemon gym fights starting at Gym #4 with Bea or Allister.
As someone who thinks very highly of Plat Fantina, I have a couple things to debate about that claim.
First, the power level may be somewhat similar between Kabu and Fantina, but the scale and the player's options are very different.
Starting with Platinum, the player may have a lot of powerful mons, sure, this is something I particularly love about Plat, they give you a lot of outright fun and powerful mons not just to the player, but also to the major battles. Heck, by that point you can have an EQ + Dragon Rage Gible. That's no joke.
But think about it. Do you actually have a mon that straight up trivializes Fantina? Do you at least have a mon that can just effortlessly deal with that crazy Mismagius chucking STAB Shadow Balls at you with no drawbacks?
Even if you pull up with say, Crunch Floatzel or even the aforementioned Gible, you're in for a real fight. Even Normal-types like Staravia kinda struggle to deal with Psybeam and there's always Confuse Ray to muck things up.
Compare that to Kabu. You'll immediately notice that glowing Dynamax button. Sure, his Centiskorch's G-Max Move is actually very strong (110BP) and traps, but it has 2 problems.
Kabu's G-Max has no weather control. In fact, his whole team doesn't and he can't do anything about it. That means that the first Max Geyser you can get (And Galar Mine has Water-types if you didn't pick Sobble.) will set up Rain for 5 turns.
That immediately puts Kabu at a disadvantage and weakens his team's win condition of just scorching everything that was softened by the Will-o-Wisp burns with G-Max Centiskorch. It also powers up your subsequent Max Geysers and that makes his own G-Max very easy to trivially OHKO.
Speaking of OHKO, Fantina's Mismagius doesn't have a 4x weakness. Kabu's Centiskorch does. And that's terrible.
To make things even worse, and that's the reason I heavily disagree with your opinion of SnS having the best Leaders in the series... They have some of the absolute worst AI in the series. It's embarrassing how bad they are, to the point of Bea not using her Machamp's G-Max Move. That by itself means that the Galarian Leaders are a joke.
Tiny correction here: Emerald has a four-Pokémon third Gym Leader with Wattson, as do B2W2 on Challenge Mode with Burgh, but it's still very early - and the first time it's been done in the first game of a Generation.
On the other hand, I should add that Galar's Gym Leaders get to fully evolved teams much sooner than any other region, with not a single NFE after Nessa, while most regions have only one or two Gym Leaders with all-fully-evolved teams (amusingly, Kalos has a mere three and... may or may not be in second place for it).
In general, actually... yeah, I totally agree with you?? As much as I complain about everything else in Sword and Shield, the Gym battles (and, in my opinion, the Gyms themselves!) were a major highlight and I thoroughly enjoyed them. I think you're absolutely right that this was one of the best League challenges in the series!
They generally weren't very hard despite their strong-looking teams, and their movesets and lack of EVs plus the player's access to Dynamax meant they weren't really as impressive as bosses from Platinum and USUM in challenge, but I feel like they all delivered on relatively surprising and enjoyable gimmicks and seemed like a huge step up from the rest of the game.
Particular shoutouts to Melony for having one of the coolest teams ever for a boss - all four of her Pokémon are new in some way (counting G-Max Lapras), three of them have in-battle form changes, and her team is also weather-themed to tie them all together (although this bit is sort of a shame because they don't make very effective use of that). Her movesets seem a little weird now that I'm looking at them properly, but I feel like they worked fine to show off all of her Pokémon as needed and hers was definitely one of the closest Gym battles for me, so I can't really complain!
I also enjoyed Raihan being doubles-themed and weather-themed his Champion Cup fight was a confused mess, but his Gym fight was super fun and I agree with the general consensus that this was a Gym Leader using off-type Pokémon "done right," and I also just thought Opal's Gym was hilarious.
I was admittedly really disappointed by Spikemuth - and by Raihan's lack of a proper Gym, although being one of the best Gym Leaders himself partially made up for that - but honestly, that was mostly because the first six Gyms set such a high standard, which was really surprising considering how I felt about the rest of the game. I didn't expect to find myself looking forward to each Gym quite that much!
I also enjoyed Raihan being doubles-themed and weather-themed his Champion Cup fight was a confused mess, but his Gym fight was super fun and I agree with the general consensus that this was a Gym Leader using off-type Pokémon "done right,"
Raihan suddenly breaking out the doubles format was awesome, and it's criminal that the SnS good AI is so underutilized because they really have great leaders and arguably the hypest Gym Leader challenge in the franchise. Not only because it's the primary focus of the story, but also because the Stadium atmosphere and the Gym Leader Battle Theme is a banger.
His Champion Cup Team was just sad though. I think he broke after the player beat him the first time. Why could he possibly think that running all weathers was a good idea?
I'd really like it if they updated his team when the DLC drops to add Garchomp to his team.
I'm sorry, but where's this stuff about significantly below average AI coming from? I admittedly don't recall the extreme specifics of each and every gym fight in SWSH, but from what I do remember it was pretty standard stuff, nothing that made me roll my eyes or go "Why did they pick that move?"
alright I know I just posted but you may notice that it was within a minute of Volt-Ikazuchi and I hadn't been able to address what they said
See, I feel like I can't really make a proper argument against this because your whole point appears to be not that they're poorly balanced but that "it's the principle of the thing!!"
I don't have a problem with the asymmetrical boss design, I have a problem with the attempts to brute-forcing the player with asymmetrical designs and the aura boosts.
The aura boosts are... part of the asymmetrical design... and part of having exactly the stats they need to pull off exactly the strategy they want...
I think you just need to look past the surface level of "oh no, they're boosting its stats! how cheap!" and focus on how it actually affects the battle: if it didn't have that omniboost, but everything else about the fight was the same, it would be one of the least threatening opponents in the game you do know Mimikyu is kinda frail and not very hard-hitting without any stat boosts, right? and also very, very incapable of getting anything done with the very strategy you outlined. The stat boost is what allows the battle to take advantage of the asymmetrical design and the awesome strategy you just described - and the end result fits perfectly in the game's difficulty curve as it is - so why does it even matter what steps it took to get there?
But alright, how about this? Picture the Totem Mimikyu fight, but instead of having an omniboost, it's level 43 or... level 42.8, while its allies stay exactly as they are. That's barely a higher level than the next major story boss, Guzma in the Shady House, who uses an entire team of three level 41s (and there's not a very long time between the two fights!), and although it has a bit of an impact on its Speed, it's hitting exactly as hard and taking hits exactly as well as it does right now.
See what I mean? The aura boost mechanic looks broken and cheap, but they could accomplish the same thing with an ugly level spike and I doubt you'd even be complaining right now. Totem Mimikyu really isn't overpowered, and it really doesn't need to lose its boost - it just looks that way if you're only paying attention to the appearance of the fight and not the way it plays out. I will admit that two of my Pokémon were immune to burns and I didn't realize what a significant part of the battle that was for other teams, so that's probably why I found it so much easier, but the rest of my point stands.
I... what even is this argument??
You agree that Araquanid's low Speed keeps it balanced, but you complain that that just shows... how careful they were to keep it balanced? How well they understood the battle they wanted to use and how precise they were in ensuring that that took place??
Araquanid has exactly the stats it needs for the battle to go as Game Freak intended - both of us agreed that that's as it should be. If it had Speed EVs, the player's access to counterplay would be too limited. Min Speed base 65 was the benchmark they wanted it to reach at +1, and they designed it to reach that benchmark. If it had no aura, the speed control gimmick would never get anywhere. If designing its stats exactly the way they did made the fight exactly the way they wanted it, how can you say that's a bad thing...?
In general, I just don't understand the point you're trying to make, and I remain entirely convinced that you're too focused on the appearance of unfairness to realize that none of the Totem Pokémon are at all unfair. You're dancing around it with a whole bunch of "doesn't count" and "but on paper...!" and simultaneously saying that they have advanced and layered strategies and that they rely too much on brute force. Editing in some quotes to show what I mean:
... because they stopped them from brute-forcing through the player.
Are the Totem Pokémon actually too hard, or are they well balanced, "but look how good a job they had to do to make it work? (and that's a bad thing!)" Or are they actually too easy? You seem to be throwing that around a bit, too, and it's not making it any easier to follow your argument...
Edit: oh my goodness, why am I like this...
I feel like this was a completely unnecessary and altogether disrespectful post? I'm looking it over again and I kind of feel like a jerk.
There was no reason for me to post in this manner. I feel like my first post on this topic was respectful enough of your opinion, but this was not... I'm sorry I was so rude here.
I didn't really find the USUM Totem Pokémon to be unfair. With the borderline exception of Araquanid (because Rain-boosted Water Bubble-boosted attacks sound dangerous... except it's Bubble what it uses, so "only" hits as hard as an unboosted Hydro Pump), they are all bosses that can be made trivial due to the existence of hard counters, but without those hard counters they are tricky to deal with.
I remember ranging from things like constantly shuffling Ekans to soften Totem Marowak's attacks, to getting rid of Totem Ribombee with Haze followed by Sludge Bomb.
Ultra Necrozma, on the other hand, I did find it unfair because there are very few things that can fight fair against it. You're almost certain to require cheese (exploiting its bad AI with Illusion, using Topsy-Turvy or Haze, or even going with FEAR) or heavy overleveling to beat it.
alright I know I just posted but you may notice that it was within a minute of Volt-Ikazuchi and I hadn't been able to address what they said
See, I feel like I can't really make a proper argument against this because your whole point appears to be not that they're poorly balanced but that "it's the principle of the thing!!"
The aura boosts are... part of the asymmetrical design... and part of having exactly the stats they need to pull off exactly the strategy they want...
I think you just need to look past the surface level of "oh no, they're boosting its stats! how cheap!" and focus on how it actually affects the battle: if it didn't have that omniboost, but everything else about the fight was the same, it would be one of the least threatening opponents in the game you do know Mimikyu is kinda frail and not very hard-hitting without any stat boosts, right? and also very, very incapable of getting anything done with the very strategy you outlined. The stat boost is what allows the battle to take advantage of the asymmetrical design and the awesome strategy you just described - and the end result fits perfectly in the game's difficulty curve as it is - so why does it even matter what steps it took to get there?
But alright, how about this? Picture the Totem Mimikyu fight, but instead of having an omniboost, it's level 43 or... level 42.8, while its allies stay exactly as they are. That's barely a higher level than the next major story boss, Guzma in the Shady House, who uses an entire team of three level 41s (and there's not a very long time between the two fights!), and although it has a bit of an impact on its Speed, it's hitting exactly as hard and taking hits exactly as well as it does right now.
See what I mean? The aura boost mechanic looks broken and cheap, but they could accomplish the same thing with an ugly level spike and I doubt you'd even be complaining right now. Totem Mimikyu really isn't overpowered, and it really doesn't need to lose its boost - it just looks that way if you're only paying attention to the appearance of the fight and not the way it plays out. I will admit that two of my Pokémon were immune to burns and I didn't realize what a significant part of the battle that was for other teams, so that's probably why I found it so much easier, but the rest of my point stands.
I... what even is this argument??
You agree that Araquanid's low Speed keeps it balanced, but you complain that that just shows... how careful they were to keep it balanced? How well they understood the battle they wanted to use and how precise they were in ensuring that that took place??
Araquanid has exactly the stats it needs for the battle to go as Game Freak intended - both of us agreed that that's as it should be. If it had Speed EVs, the player's access to counterplay would be too limited. Min Speed base 65 was the benchmark they wanted it to reach at +1, and they designed it to reach that benchmark. If it had no aura, the speed control gimmick would never get anywhere. If designing its stats exactly the way they did made the fight exactly the way they wanted it, how can you say that's a bad thing...?
In general, I just don't understand the point you're trying to make, and I remain entirely convinced that you're too focused on the appearance of unfairness to realize that none of the Totem Pokémon are at all unfair. You're dancing around it with a whole bunch of "doesn't count" and "but on paper...!" and simultaneously saying that they have advanced and layered strategies and that they rely too much on brute force. Editing in some quotes to show what I mean:
But...and this is...And Totems unfairly brute-force through the player, which you can see because...... because they stopped them from brute-forcing through the player.
Are the Totem Pokémon actually too hard, or are they well balanced, "but look how good a job they had to do to make it work? (and that's a bad thing!)" Or are they actually too easy? You seem to be throwing that around a bit, too, and it's not making it any easier to follow your argument...
Ok, I think it really got a bit too confusing, mostly because the very idea of GF nuking the Totem mons' stats just so they could apply these silly boosts is confusing to me.
It's not that the Totem boosts are unfair. I dislike the asymmetrical boss idea of the Totems, but I understand their intent behind it.
What bothers me is the idea of just adding those boosts in an vain idea of stacking advantages onto the Totems so they feel like more imposing bosses because that overshadows the strategies they have. (Which is why I praised Totem Mimikyu.)
I also think that these bosses feel like they use fake difficulty because of these boosts, even though the completely neutered stats make this only an impression.
I will admit however, that I did not know Totem Araquanid had such pitiful speed to acommodate those boosts because I played Ultra Moon blind.
I guess I can summarize that even further with "I got a problem with the idea, but not the execution."
Ok, I think it really got a bit too confusing, mostly because the very idea of GF nuking the Totem mons' stats just so they could apply these silly boosts is confusing to me.
It's not that the Totem boosts are unfair. I dislike the asymmetrical boss idea of the Totems, but I understand their intent behind it.
What bothers me is the idea of just adding those boosts in an vain idea of stacking advantages onto the Totems so they feel like more imposing bosses because that overshadows the strategies they have. (Which is why I praised Totem Mimikyu.)
I also think that these bosses feel like they use fake difficulty because of these boosts, even though the completely neutered stats make this only an impression.
I will admit however, that I did not know Totem Araquanid had such pitiful speed to acommodate those boosts because I played Ultra Moon blind.
I guess I can summarize that even further with "I got a problem with the idea, but not the execution."
Well since we're on the topic of difficulty let's throw my hot take: Pokemon games' difficulty is 90% based around how you play it.
Anytime someone says "oh come on X game is too easy" I have callbacks of two particular Emerald runs I've done. One, a solo run with Mudkip where I leveled Marshtomp to level 24 on Route 103 because... I don't even know honestly. And, the other one, a Nuzlocke where I deliberately underleveled.
Now, I have mentioned how much I've replayed the Gen 3 games. So I pretty much knew what to expect on each major battle. Even with that, that Mudkip run had no casualties and the Nuzlocke ended with 15 casualties, including the final battle against Tate&Liza where I got wiped out because my highest leveled Pokemon was 37.
Now I understand that it may sound like a slight hyperbole. And, it might be. So I have a better example:
Colosseum was BRUTAL. I just played that game, and maybe I missed something, but I found it brutal compared to any other games and I do believe it is the hardest Pokemon game I've played (perhaps even more than, dare I say it... Pokemon R a n g e r). I finished the game with a team of Legendary Beasts + Flygon, Quagsire and Espeon, which considering the choices wasn't too bad a team. The main thing tho, was the levels. It never crossed through my head to spend a few hours grinding because idk why, so I came facing these level 60 final battles with level 47-49 Pokemon. Having to catch one Pokemon in each final battle, even with the Master Ball glitch, doesn't help. Explains why I got wiped out a total of 5 times between the two of them. I'm terrified of how XD will be like...
Anyways, the point is, a good part of how hard a Pokemon game is comes from how you go about your game, most of which is from how much you level and how good/bad your team selection is. If you're that one psycho who spends hours grinding on first-route Pokemon, that might explain why it's easy. If you're five levels below your opponent, that might explain why you're stuck.
Anyways, the point is, a good part of how hard a Pokemon game is comes from how you go about your game, most of which is from how much you level and how good/bad your team selection is. If you're that one psycho who spends hours grinding on first-route Pokemon, that might explain why it's easy. If you're five levels below your opponent, that might explain why you're stuck.
Totem Araquanid
