Pokemon Scarlet & Violet - 18th Nov 2022! **OFFICIAL INFO ONLY**

I don’t they at all were thinking about how to balance Dynamax. You know it was already bad enough in Single, but man you can just many any Pokemon immune to the most important Doubles move for free and your buffs/debuffs apply to the Pokemon next to you/your target.

And in more recent times, I have realize that Terastallize could be broken in doubles because you have Tera Ghost types to make anything immune to Fake Out (though not as broken as Dynamax).
Nah they were, there's a reason max knuckle and ooze have a smaller bp overall vs other moves, and all those changes were deliberate to make sure dmax actually had impact and didnt get snuffed out in a turn. Probably because they see the time limit as its own balancing, so denying it more was unbalanced against dmax. Whether you agree or not is a different discussion altogether
 

ScraftyIsTheBest

On to new Horizons!
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I would point that it's extremely unlikely we get anything Pokemon related in this since Pokemon gets its own events.

Also something something Europe isn't getting the direct so we'll have to... watch the american one which is in english anyway.
I'm not holding up hope for Pokemon stuff to be here, but I wouldn't entirely rule it out either.

There is precedent for Pokemon sometimes showing up in Nintendo Directs: namely with, lo and behold, Sword and Shield. I know this was 3 years ago but back in the September 2019 Direct they briefly showed off some SwSh stuff in said direct revealing Pokemon Camp as well as a few new mons (ie Cramorant and Polteageist) so there *may* be a chance that they'll throw in a small tidbut of SV stuff here too.

Of course I wouldn't guarantee it, but it could be possible. Possibly in a similar manner to SwSh where we see SV's Pokemon Amie equivalent and maybe a few more new Pokemon, nothing substantial but it would be something.
 
Forget about anything related con SV in that Direct. It's a mini direct, one of those in which they talk about releases and theyll probably anounce a port of Metroid Prime 1 despite MP4 being in the limbo for the past 974 years.
 

Pikachu315111

Ranting & Raving!
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Second story is titled "Path of Legends" where you help Arven find the Herba Mystica.

While Victory Road is more your traditional Pokemon game, Path of Legends looks to be taking cues from Gen VII with the boss for each McGuffin wasn't a powerful trainer but rather a gigantic Pokemon. Going by what Arven says in the trailer, the species of the "Titan Pokemon" don't grow to be as big as they are, so they're similar to the Totem Pokemon in that regard as well. Now the Totem Pokemon were that big because of Ultra Space energy that seeped through Ultra Wormholes. Obviously that's probably not going to be the reason the Titan Pokemon are that big, so the question what is? At the moment, with the limited information we have, I have two suspicions:

  1. The weakest one is, to stick with the Totem Pokemon parallels, maybe it has to do with Terastallizing, or at least the power behind it. Though Totem Pokemon are connected to Ultra Space which links them to both Ultra Beasts and Z-Moves, the only major boon Totem Pokemon got was (a) stat boost(s) in addition to their size increase; no special trait (like having the Beast Boost Ability) or ability to use Z-Moves. Could be putting the cart before the Mudsdale, but I have a feeling we don't have to worry about the Titan Pokemon Terastallizing (that feels like a gimmick they'll save for major trainer NPCs like the Pokemon League and maybe Team Star bosses).

  2. The more apparent one would be the Herba Mystica. With that name, and its description of healing a Pokemon instantly as if that's magical, it likely has some other special things connected to it.

Going on a tangent about the Herba Mystica, it at the moment doesn't sound like anything special. "Immediately restore health once eaten", like, have you been to a PokeMart lately? Or hey, has your Pokemon eaten a Sitrus or Oran Berry, their effects might surprise you! Joking aside, with Arven being a... chef? They say Arven is a good cook and he wants to use the Herba Mystica to make powerful recipes, but they don't really give him any titles like "chef", wonder if that's a factor in things. Anyway, he wants to use the Herba Mystica in recipes so I wonder if they're even going to be items you can carry in your Bag or if they're something which Arven "collects" and what you get is new meals unlocked that'll probably do what the Curry did in SwSh but with maybe more effects like increasing Effort Values and, just realizing this, changing a Pokemon's Tera Type. If the Herba Mystica are those crystal plants which we saw the player and Arven looking at in some trailers & screenshots that would make the Herba Mystica have some connection with Terastal (I'll also bet the places you find the Herba Mystica are also spots where you can restore the Tera Orb without having to go to a Pokemon Center).


Going back to the Titan Pokemon, we've had several large Pokemon battles these last few gens with all of them handled differently. In Gen VII the Totem Pokemon had one/some stat(s) boosted at the start of the battle and used SOS to call in a helper Pokemon. In SwSh we had Dynamax, notably the Max Lairs, where the Pokemon got double HP, was able to put up barriers, and would sometimes use Max Moves. Then Legends: Arceus had both the Alpha Pokemon (which were just stronger Pokemon) and the Noble Pokemon (though admittedly this one is an outliner as you don't battle the Noble Pokemon in a traditional sense (well, you get the opportunity to, though it's not the majority of the battle and honestly probably better to keep throwing balms than battling)). So, where will the Titan Pokemon fall? A fun thing about the Titant Pokemon is that they are treated as a special Pokemon, each having their title above their HP (and, like with Gym Battles, no Level present). If they're treating this as a special boss, I would think having more HP than the usual Pokemon like Dynamax Pokemon did isn't unreasonable (though will it be able to put up barriers in the question), as for the other stats I could use a bit of Totem thrown in having on or more of those increased to make the Titan feel stronger right at the start. I don't think there would be any SOS Battles though, having more HP I think would more than make up for that, especially if it has an outside of turn order way to give itself additional protection or heal (which, being the guardian of a Herba Mystica, is a possibility (as annoying as it'll probably be with any strong Wild Pokemon that can heal *side glances at Tapu Fini* )).


Let's see, any other thoughts. Oh, well something I forgot to mention last time is that Nemona is a part of the Victory Road story as Arven is to this one; though Nemona will be more like the usual Rival via battling you occasionally while Arven feels like he'll be more like a companion helping with things outside of battle which he needs you to do. Also, curious why this story in particular is called "Path of Legends". While I'm sure the Herba Mystica has some legends connected to it, the story title feels a bit grandiose for something that sounds like you're just stealing collecting a plant from a bigger than usual Pokemon. I had predicted this storyline would have to do more with the Professors, their research (which is on the legends of the region), and possibly the Legendary Pokemon. Also, it doesn't sound like those stone tower has anything to do with this, so (1) if they're not connected what are they for or (2) if they are connected how do they fit in this (would the towers contain a hint where to find the Herba Mystica, meaning there would be 15 of them)?

(Tomorrow I'll finished this by posting about Team Star which is the one I really have thoughts on)
 
I'm thinking that the plot of the Herba Mystica quest would be that Arven wants to save his dying relative.
Nah, it's to unlock the code of an ancient hidden nuclear weapon whose activation requirements were made super obscure by design.
The Herba Mystica is Starf Berry 2: Electric Boogaloo. Mark my words.
RSE (About the Starf Berry) said:
So strong, it was abandoned at the world's edge. Considered a mirage.
starf_bomb.jpg
 

bdt2002

Pokémon Ranger: Guardian Signs superfan
is a Pre-Contributor
Tecnically, we did get to know that Pokemon Stadium and 2 are coming to Nintendo Switch. :psysly:

But don't get your hopes up
View attachment 453075
I think people are misunderstanding the word “transferred” here. Just as technical is the fact you aren’t transferring a Pokémon *to* the Stadium games themselves. I’d like to think there’s a big difference between transferring a Pokémon and using it on a console battle simulator.

Let’s also take into account the fact that N64 Transfer Pak emulation hasn’t been announced yet. If that fine print wasn’t there, people are more likely to watch the trailer and think something’s up with the 3DS Virtual Console games. But, as we all know, the eShop will be closing over there, and even if it wasn’t, VC game listings and Nintendo Switch Online run on different servers and can’t connect. And before anyone says Pokémon Bank and Pokémon HOME, that’s actually not true, especially once 2023 hits.
 
The real copium is whether the stadium games being rereleased means Colosseum/XD rereleases in the future.
Now this would be something I'd gladly inhale copium for... too bad there's GameCube at play here and I don't think we have any of these games available yet.. do we
 
I want a new Stadium game, but more so want GameFreak to make Single Player and Multiplayer kind of seperate.
They can have a single player advanture in a pair of games and have a Multiplayer game (prefferably like Home) where you can battle players. This is so that they can balance the multiplayer with balance patches to change stats, movepools, items, ect.
I don’t care if it’s an actual new Stadium game. I really just want balance patches in new games.
 

Pikachu315111

Ranting & Raving!
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And finally there's ★ Starfall Street , the "villain" team storyline. Yes, this time it seems like the villain team (though I guess maybe in this case "antagonist team" would be a better description) is its own side story instead of having the team messing with you throughout them all.

Team Rocket was the mafia/yakuza, Aqua & Magma were environmental terrorists, Galactic was a space cult, Plasma was PETA, Neo Plasma were black ops pirates, Flare were genocidal elitists, Skull were thugs, Aether Foundation was a humanitarian organization (with a dark secret of genetic experimentation and dangerous dimensional research), Yell were punks (and later revealed to also be the Gym Trainers & groupies of Galar's Dark-Type Gym Leader), and Macro Cosmos was a massive business conglomerate. So, what new flavor of villain/antagonist does Team Star bring us? Bosozoku!

(BTW, all the stories had their own beautifully drawn eye catches, but I feel this one is the most interesting at the moment for one reason we'll discuss)

For those who don't know what a Bosozoku is, think Greaser/Bike Gang but more flashy. Also, and this is important to the story, they're usually school delinquents. And that's what Team Star, they're apparently rebellious students of the Academy, the grunts being just students wearing slightly modified versions of the basic school uniform (and a helmet).


So, already this brings up my first question: Why are bothering them? Like, it would be one thing if they're in the way, and it does look like at least the Fire Crew have put up a blockade on the north side of Paldea (though I guess there's nothing stopping you from just going around the south side, going assume after a certain percent of progress you get quick travel which makes getting around them a non-hassle). But, if the flags are the location of the other crews, than they're mostly out of the way of at least the main paths. "Well, you don't have to do their story". And that's just it; first of all everyone is going to do all the stories, it just depends on what order we do them in. But most importantly for them to even be a story option there has to be a reason given to the player to start messing with them. Now I'm not saying the game isn't going to give one (they do mention they make trouble like Team Skull did in Alola, but Team Skull got involved in the main story), but for Victory Road and Path of Legends we were given clear objectives and reason we're doing them (to become a Champion and help Arven make Herba Mystica recipes we can use, respectively). But not here, we're not told why nor what do we even get from taking on Team Star (which honestly sounds more like something the Academy itself should be handling; are you really telling me the player, a new trainer, is going to be better prepared to deal with delinquents around their age then the staff of powerful trainer teachers?). Also, after we defeat the boss, what then? I don't think just defeating the boss in a Pokemon Battle is going to make them decide to stop being delinquents, so what is the goal?

Anyway, for whatever reason, we're going to be storming their bases (yes, send the new student into the middle of gang territory, that'll end well) but unlike previous games where we just normally battled grunts until they had no more bodies to throw at us, we're going to be using the new Auto Battle system. But here's where it gets a bit confusing because the part of the site that talks about Auto Battle mentions we can only have one Pokemon out, meanwhile the trailer and screenshots show we have two Pokemon out and seemingly Auto Battling. Sure, they can make the Auto Battles different when you're raiding a Team Star base than when you're just exploring; but that's an inconsistency which I feel the site could give a quick mention of: "BTW, while raiding the Team Star base, you can send out more than just one Pokemon to Auto Battle, unlike when using the Let's Go feature when exploring Paldea where you can only send out one".


So, after watching the game use our Pokemon to knock out the Grunt's Pokemon (they only mention using Auto Battle, no normal battles, so what else am I supposed to take from that?), we fight the crew boss and their Starmobiles. Now this is where info gets murky. Now, we do have normal battles with the boss, and interesting enough their Pokemon do have Levels, but the site mentions its not just the boss's Pokemon we need to defeat but also their Starmobile (which will also get in the way while battling). Also, I noticed that the Levels the bosses Pokemon are using is much higher than the player's, much higher that I don't think even Type Advantage would normally neutralize. Also, at least for Mela, during her battle she sends out a bright orb above the field, not sure if that's there for aesthetic or has something to do with the gimmick of these battles. How are they going to keep their Pokemon from just knocking out our Pokemon like which would likely happen in a normal battle?


And that's not even going into the Starmobiles. I don't see an HP bar for them, so it doesn't seem like you're damaging the Starmobile directly or at least in a way that's "destroying" it? Also, aside from the engine having an eye, the above art all but confirms that is a Pokemon, and while I previously suggested it might be a Pokemon possessing the engine; no, I don't think the Pokemon's tongue would be coming out of the... *looks up car diagrams* I think that's the air filter, unless the Pokemon was the engine. At least I'm assuming the Pokemon is just an engine, it could be car chassis and frame too. Apparently the Starmobile doesn't have wheels and instead is hovering, at least Mela's. Cause that's something to keep in mind, there's at least five (six if there's an overall boss) of the crew bosses and I wouldn't be surprised if each had a different looking Starmobile. Like Mela's one looks to be based on a van of some kind, like a cargo of passenger van, but fashioned into a sort of hot rod (it looks like Rodimus Prime for you Transformers fans reading this). But I can see others having like a monster truck, a hummer, maybe even getting their hands on a utility vehicle like a fire engine or a truck with an aerial platform (like the trucks which work on powerlines). Bet at least one is a limousine (if they make them different vehicles and don't just copy & paste the same one but in different colors).

One last thing I wanted to mention, as we know they're split up into crews with Mela's crew being called the "Schedar Squad". So, what does "Schedar" mean? Well, it's not exactly a word, but rather its name. A name of a, get ready for it, a star! "Never heard of them". Not a celebrity, I man one of the big balls of burning gas in space!

Schedar is the name of a star in the Cassiopeia constellation. In astronomy it's given the designation of "Alpha Cassiopeiae" and is considered one of the main five stars that make up the constellation. Even though it's one of the middle stars it was likely given the alpha designation because its usually the brightest star in the constellation; that and it being a red giant could be why it was given as the name of Mela's squad as they're the Fire-type crew (we won't get into how red stars are actually cooler than the sun and is only brighter because its closer to us than the others...).

So, you're probably wondering why I mentioned all that. Well, for those paying attention, you'll note I said it was one of FIVE stars in the constellation. And how many flags indicating Team Star bases were there? Five. And, yes, each star has a name likely meaning we know, at the very least, the name of each squad (and if you're wondering if the name has any meaning, they just generally mean the part of the body that star is positioned at in the constellation). "WAIT! How do you even know that's going to be the case? What if each squad is just named after a bright star"? Good point, but if that was the case than none of the stars in the Cassiopeia constellation reaches the luminosity of the brightest stars, and also the position of the flags on the map "vaguely" matchs the positions of the stars in the constellation (and the Schedar Squad is in the same place where the star Schedar is in the constellation):
TeamStarConstellation.png


.So then, if true, here are what the other squads would be called:

LETTER - FLAG COLOR - NAME - TRANSLATION
  • Alpha - Red - Schedar - Derived from the Arabic word for "breast".
  • Beta - Yellow - Caph - Derived from the Arabic word for "palm" (as in "palm of your hand).
  • Gamma - Purple - "Navi" - Originally had no name, was given "Navi" by Virgil Ivan "Gus" Grissom as a joke on planning charts (its his middle name spelled backwards). Grissom would sadly lose his life during a test launch of Apollo 1 and since then NASA has used "Navi" as a nickname for the star.
  • Delta - Blue - Ruchbah - Derived from the Arabic word for "knee".
  • Epsilon - Orange/Pink - Segin - Unknown origin.
Each name is linked to a website that gives some more facts about the star. Here's the ones which standout to me:

  • While I think this theory is plausible, there is another possible list of star names. While Schedar may not be on the top 50 list of brightest star, it (and the other stars in the constellation) are bright that a few get into the top 100. Schedar is so bright is considered a "Navigational Star" because its easy to identify in the night sky. It shares this distinction with names of these following stars (and in parenthesis I'll put the constellation they're in): Capella (Auriga), Vega (Lyra), Deneb (Cygnus), Mirfak (Perseus), Alioth (Ursa Major), Dubhe (Ursa Major), Alkaid (Ursa Major), Polaris (Ursa Minor), Kochab (Ursa Minor), and Eltanin (Draco). So if one of there names are used instead they're using the Navigational Stars as the squad names.

  • Caph is a giant white star that's the oldest (over a billion years old), smallest, and least brightest of the 5 stars; it's only so bright because its also the "nearest" to Earth.

  • Navi is a spectroscopic binary star, meaning it has another star-like object orbiting around it in a way we can see the spectral line of that object's orbit; this companion object is the size of our Sun (and there may be a third orbiting object). It is the youngest (only 8 million), biggest, hottest, and technically most luminous. However, its also the most furthest away from us, thus from Earth it appears Schedar and Caph are brighter.

  • Ruchbah is an eclipsing binary star, meaning its orbiting companion crosses the "line of sight" we have with the star. There's also thought to be a giant debris disk around it, 88 Astronomical Units radius (as reminder, an AU is the distance between the Earth and our Sun; and if you're trying to visualize that, here's help: you can line-up 11,700 Earths between the distance of the Earth and our Sun; So doing the raw math, this speculated debris disk has a radius of over 1 million Earths lined-up).

  • Segin is the faintest star from our point of view even though its technically the second most luminous, this is because its the second most furthest away from Earth. It's believed to have a gas shell around it that it has ejected.
So, you're probably wondering why even do this? Well, from what little I could find, Portugal apparently has a good view of not just the Cassiopeia constellation but also the Andromeda galaxy during the Summer. Why did I mention the Andromeda galaxy? Because the constellation is attributed to Queen Cassiopeia, the mother of (Princess) Andromeda. If you're not familiar with the Greek myth, basically Queen Cassiopeia boasted that her and/or her daughter were more beautiful than the Nerieds, sea nymphs and daughters of Nereus, a primordial being of the sea. But even more notably, they were companions of Poseidon and his wife was one of them. So, Poseidon got mad and demanded Andromeda be sacrificed to one of his sea monsters or said sea monster will destroy their kingdom. As Andromeda, chained to a rock, waited to be eaten, Greek hero Perseus slew the monster and saved Andromeda who would become his wife. But, still mad, Poseidon turned his wrath onto Queen Cassiopeia who he placed in the sky as a constellation, tied to her chair in the same position that Andromeda was chained to the rock.

Not sure if the mythology part would have anything to do with Team Star, though it's still all interesting.


I guess I shouldn't be surprised they didn't put racing into a Pokemon game... even though this game's antagonist team's aesthetic is based on a subculture which main thing was racing around (not to mention you have a Legendary Pokemon as a motorcycle). Also, no mention of Penny so her and her involvement is probably going to be left as a surprise.

And I would say that's it for my thoughts on the three Treasure Hunt stories. Sorry it took me a while, schedule been a bit out busy, but I'm all good now. :blobthumbsup:
 

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