Legendary Pokemon / TLR General Discussion Thread

[Its_A_Random]

Kinda a suggestion, but what is going to amount from the discussions about substitutions? At the moment, the player being permitted only one non-KO substitution before the boss is very annoying for the players playing, especially in the times before the data became more visible to the public. There has been a consensus where two substitutions for all encounters in the TLR is generally a good idea, & in this day & age in a format like Triples, this should be necessary. Sure TLR's may become less difficult as a result, but only very slightly; not enough to really worry about.

Or at the very least, two non-KO subs for all encounters past the lackeys, or even just allowing two-subs at the Guardians & the Boss if we are so stubborn about not changing the substitution limits.

 

[zarator]

Frankly, having only one sub against some bosses is kinda stupid. Sure, most legends available so far are very offensive, with only a few tricks up their sleeve. However, good luck dealing with something like Deoxys with just one sub. I'm all for increasing the number of non-KO subs to 2.

 

[Geodude6]

iirc at the boss you are allowed 2 non-KO subs. However, having only 1 sub against 30-40 move guardians is just silly. Lackeys don't seem to cause much complaints, so I propose that players get 1 sub at Lackeys and 2 subs at everything else.

 

[Gerard]

The reason people don't complain about lackeys is that you order second against them round one, so you're likely to murder them or leave them weak enough that you can beat them quickly, leaving you for not much stuff to sub for

 

[Its_A_Random]

Then we have more "smarter" sets of lackeys like those residing in Amperage Stream (Chinchou + Electrike, with personal bias here) or Heaven's Ascent (Snorunt + Bonsly + Klink) (Or even the old Tower of Ash pre-revamps which was basically in a nutshell: Nintendo Hard. Trust me, you are lucky you never saw those ones. I could reveal here, but that is mega tangential & way off topic), where it is likely that you are not exactly going to walk over them. After going through one of those sets of lackeys, is one non-KO substitution going to be enough for round two?

That was a rhetorical question by the way; do not answer.

Also just saying, not much complaints about lackeys is a terrible excuse to keep substitutions there at 1 + KO Substitutions, especially without any reason to back it up.

 

[Its_A_Random]

Given the fact that I now co-own TLR & that nobody has really objected to this, I am going to decree that all new TLR's will now allow the player to make up to two non-KO substitutions for all encounters.

My justification for this is above & I do not think dogfish will mind the change either.

FishEdit: IAR thinks correctly.

 

[zarator]

Sorry for necroing, was advised against opening another thread.

Basically, after a lengthy discussion on #capasb with Dogfish44 and Its_A_Random , I think something must be done for the obnoxious length of the Legend Runs. Basically, the main problem is that the amount of updating required for most runs is simply excessive. For example, consider Planet's Fury (I'll try to be as conservative as possible, assuming you defeat Lackeys in 1-2 rounds and Guardians in 4 rounds):

Lackeys: 3 updates
Event (Strange Room): 3 updates (average)
Event (Strange Room): 3 updates (average)
Lackeys: 3 updates
Guardians: 5 updates
Event (Obstructed Ascent): 3 updates (average)
Event (Obstructed Ascent): 3 updates (average)
Lackeys: 2 updates
Event (Obstructed Ascent): 3 updates (average)
Event (Obstructed Ascent): 3 updates (average)
Boss: ? updates

Number of updates based on each event

Strange Room
Iron Sphere: 1-3 updates
Obtuse Garden: 5 updates
Tiered Balconies: 4 updates
Musty Library: 1-4 updates
Average: 3 updates
---------------------------
Obstructed Ascent
Lordly Landing -> Velvet Throne: 2-5 updates
Lordly Landing -> Opulent Nest: 4 updates
Clockwork Platform: 1-3 updates
Bladed Walkway: 1 update
Unseen Path: 5 updates
Desert Expanse (Flygon): 5 updates
Desert Expanse (void): 2 updates
Oasis: 2 updates
Average: 3 updates

So basically, you need 31 updates at the VERY minimum to get to the boss (which will likely require 5-10 updates of its own to be defeated). Assuming you get a ref who's active enough to ref 1.5 times per day (I'll tell you, this is a very generous assumption), it means you need nearly 2 months... just to get to the boss!



For this reason, in order to avoid people having to spend half a year in a couple reruns - just to try and get a certain legend (remember than in that "half a year" we are not even factoring the time you spend collecting the Pokemon and the CC you need for the run, or the time you spend in the TLR queue until you're picked up), I want to propose a checkpoint system for making reruns slightly easier.

The system, in its first draft, would work like this: everytime the player defeats Lackeys and Guardians, he also "saves the game", so to speak. Should he wipe, he can choose to redo the run with a different team and different items, OR to continue the ongoing run from one of the past checkpoints. Naturally, we'd need some clauses to prevent exploit, such as:

1) Every checkpoint can't be used more than once (or perhaps twice): if you wipe in the event after Guardians, "reload" your game and wipe again, you have to restart all over again
2) If you claim the rewards for your completed TLR in Prize Claiming, you can't "continue" it.
3) If you "load the game", any progress past that point is lost. So, if you got a KOC in the event right after Guardians and then wipe and restart from after Guardians, that KOC would be lost.

Thoughts?

 

[Frosty]

That is literally the best idea I have ever seen for TLR. I just can't agree with it more.

The checkpoint would be a snapshot of the team when the guardians were defeated including items and what-not. I see it being awesome for when you make a mistake or hax happens, but the overall strategy was sound. Of course, if it were a problem in strategy then you need to go back to the begining to see if your new strategy can pass the first challenges just as well.

I mean, having to redo everything just because of a crit is a real bummer...

 

[Texas Cloverleaf]

So much yes. Prevents the infamous legend crit kills among other things. I'd want "load saves" to have to be undertaken immediately, however, to prevent potential conflicts with prize claims.

 

[Deck Knight]

I'm not necessarily opposed, but how does the proposal save any time? It certainly doesn't for the refs.

Also as far as prize claiming, we'd need to ask people to re-run *immediately* because otherwise they just make the claim, update their team, and a week later its like "so I want to restart from the Guardians..."

 

[zarator]

Deck Knight As far as saving any time, it probably doesn't for "first runners", but it does if you wipe and need to redo. Since apparently none in the community is truly willing to cut down on the actual length of TLRs - i.e. reducing the number of events - this seemed at least better than nothing. It still doesn't exclude the possibility of cutting down the TLR's length later on.

As for the prize claiming thing, if we use a "cached" system, they would not be able to update their Pokemon, since they'd have to use them as they were when they "saved the game" - same HP, same En, same nature, same moves, etc etc.

 

[Mulan15262]

About the checkpoints, how would ref pay be determined? Would refs get payed for everything, or just before the checkpoint was reached and after it was last reseted to?

 

[ff7hero]

I would hope that refs would get to claim for all updates.

 

[zarator]

Well, refs would be paid as usual. If you reffed something, you get paid for what you reffed. And it would not be a problem for the ref to claim such a run.

 

[Birkal]

So I reread through this thread since almost a year has passed since zarator pulled the statistics for the original post of the thread. While there have been a lot of significant improvements to TLR as a result of this thread (ball mechanics and backpack size), I wondered what the statistics of TLR has looked like as a result in the past year. It's pretty bleak, but let me show you:

TLR Statistics

MC
Eternal_Drifer Lost
Gerard Lost
AOPSUser Lost
Geodude6 Lost
Yoshinite DQ
Someoneelse Lost
Dummy007 Lost
Texas Cloverleaf Active
youngjake93 Active
ZhengTann Active

TT
SubwayJ Lost
deadfox081 DQ
Yarnus of Bethany DQ
waterwarrior Win
Ragnarokalex DQ
smashlloyd20 Lost
Its_A_Random DQ
Elevator Music Needs Ref

WSM
LouisCyphre DQ

FSQ
Imanalt Lost
EspyOwner DQ
Pwnemon Lost
Dogfish44 DQ
SubwayJ Lost
Frosty Active
Birkal Active

BSC
Athenodoros DQ
Engineer Pikachu Lost

RE
Arcanite Lost
AOPSUser Active

Glacial Cave
The Wanderer Needs Ref

EM
zarator Active
starwarsfan DQ

For anyone counting, that's 1 win, 12 losses, 10 disqualifications, 7 active, and 2 needing subrefs. It's great to see that there are more active TLRs running at the moment; that's likely a result in Rediamond, Frosty, waterwarrior, and myself taking on some of the load. But from there, the statistics are depressing. Only one winner in the past year (waterwarrior snagged a Regice) is tragic. 12 losses would be semi-acceptable if they were mostly on the difficult TLRs, but they are not. Half of them are from Mysterious Cove alone, and it's a Beginner level TLR! As you increase difficulty in the statistics, you'll note that the majority of the disqualifications occur on the hard TLRs. Why is that? I'd argue that the paths are so long, it ends in disqualification because users cannot commit more than six months to a forum game. Put on top of that The Wanderer waiting for two months and Elevator Music waiting for one entire year, and we know that something is up with TLR.

Save points is excellent; let's implement them immediately. But it's not enough, in my mind. I'm cool with having 1 / 25 runs ending in a victory (honestly). What grinds my gears is that statistic takes a year to compile, not three months. I'll just come out and say it: The Legend Run in its current variation is not a test of competitive aptitude, it's a measure of luck and how long you are willing to wait. The model is inefficient, to put it bluntly. Referees are being required to do too much work, while battlers need to depend on getting a good RNG and sitting around waiting. The best and most exciting test in ASB should not be this way. The Gym League churns out highly competitive battles in one to two months. zarator's Raids get people through an enjoyable roleplay that challenges skill and ability in a short amount of time. So why are these programs much more popular than TLR? Because it's inefficient and needs to be seriously reworked.

I think the proposal for changing how many events are in a TLR is sound, but we first need to approach this from a philosophical level. How many people do we want winning legends each year? What is the ideal W/L ratio for TLR as a whole? How long should each difficulty of TLR take (assuming consistent reffing)? Once we start answering these questions, we can get about fixing what should be the best part of ASB: capturing and raising legends. Let's not let this sit around for another year, please. Let's get some standards and start matching the runs to them. If anything, we've learned that our current path isn't leading us anywhere good; we need to address the data and revise as necessary.

 

[Texas Cloverleaf]

Fwiw you can raise that number by 1 as I'm well on pace to capture a legendary in the near future.

As far as how many people should be winning in a year? Five at most as far as I'm concerned. It's well documented that legendaries are not the most powerful pokemon in the game and are frequently weaker, average mons at best. What are then? Status symbols. They are the indicator that you are worthy of being named among ASBs greats, that you conquered the hardest challenge this game has to offer. So insofar as difficulty is concerned, stay the course; no change is necessary.

With respect to real time duration of the TLRs there are two components we can examine: referee update speed, and challenger posting speed. Referee speed has been talked about frequently and has made progressive improvements with referees being hired and sticking to deadlines for the most part. As always, New suggestions to improve the situation are always beneficial. However, something that's effectively never discussed is how long challengers take to order. Before we can begin thinking of ways to improve tlr efficiency we need to put some effort in understanding the entire picture and what effect this aspect of the challenge has on its duration. Several TLRs I can think of, my own included, could have moved somewhat quicker apace if the challenger had posted every time in a quick and timely manner. I suggest looking through the TLRs of the last year and finding the average post time in days of all combat order sets posted by challengers (role play and maintenance taking negligible time) to determine this impact.

We also should discuss whether this impact can be reasonably held as alterable within the scope of TLR. Should we consider implementing a more strict DQ on TLR and what kind of effect would that have on the rate of challenger DQs. Should we wait until we can affirm referees as managing their own DQs before this time and so on.


With respect to TLR mechanics themselves I encourage discussion on potentially shortening the length and the ramifications therein and urge Dogfish44 and Its_A_Random to implement the save feature proposed by zarator swiftly.

 

[Deck Knight]

Couple of different ways to handle this.

As far as reffing lags, we need to clone zarator and make zarator clones 1-10 refs. Other than that I'd place some blame on the fact I allowed *way* too much latitude on scenarios and trusting people's judgement. Mystic Marsh's Maze is an example of an RP that's just ridiculously long and overly complicated. I don't think it's a coincidence one of my originals is the one somebody won on, because although there are some branches, it's very linear. The RPs are basically about choosing your poison and living with the vastly different, equally dangerous sorts of encounters. The only things ref have to do is input the straightforward triggered trap conditions, and the only thing they generally have to RNG is the Lackeys/Guardians that have 2 out of 3 rotating Pokemon.

I don't really think the 3 vs 2 triples format is too slow in and of itself. 6 Moves vs 4 is I feel a necessary advantage, and the refs are generally doing 10 actions a round - LESS than the prolific doubles match format. There might be a third damage calc on spread moves, but that's just how it is.

I chatted with zarator yesterday and there were a few suggestions he made I liked quite a bit. The first was on tweaking difficulty by modifying the length of dungeons, so only the Uber dungeons would retain the present number of encounters. Legendary dungeons would have one less RP before the Guardians, and the Training dungeons would have 1 RP each between the Lackeys, Guardians, and the Boss.

I think a few guidelines on what constitutes an RP would be beneficial. We've no need to remake LouisCyphre's RP (which was awesome when we did it but the concept shrunk down makes TLRs way too long).

Basically, an RP should not be its own miniature version of the entire process, like MM's Maze. These were great and flavorful ideas, but they suck up time and updates like nothing else. The challenge should be focused in "What does this particular trap / nest / horde do that poses a specific obstacle to a potential team suitable for taking on the boss encounter." Fixed damage non-Pokemon traps seems like a new thing and I honestly don't like it, especially if it operates on a psuedo-random basis.

The full chat is in hide tags below:

IRC Log

[18:48] <Deck_Knight> Hullo
[18:48] <Zarator> hey DK
[18:48] <Zarator> do you need anything?
[18:48] <Deck_Knight> Birkal suggested I discuss some of the proposals with you.
[18:49] <Zarator> proposals about what?
[18:49] <Deck_Knight> I saw the one on savestates.
[18:49] <Deck_Knight> TLR ones
[18:49] <Zarator> mm
[18:49] <Zarator> Sure
[18:49] <Deck_Knight> Birkal said you had another though on making them shorter in general.
[18:50] <Zarator> Well, my main worry is that
[18:50] <Deck_Knight> It sounds feasible provided we shift it so that less encounters = harder individual battles.
[18:50] <Zarator> IMO, 30-40 updates, just to get to the boss of a TLR
[18:50] <Zarator> is too much for my taste
[18:50] <Zarator> I understand that legends are supposed to be coveted prizes and all that
[18:51] <Zarator> but IMO that should be reflected in the difficulty of TLRs, not in their sheer length. And some Events in particular IMO are mostly just time dumps
[18:51] <Zarator> We could change nothing, mechanics-wise
[18:51] <Zarator> while still cut it down by at least 5-10 updates
[18:51] <Zarator> for example, did you look at Planet's Fury?
[18:52] <Zarator> http://www.smogon.com/forums/threads/tlr-data-the-planets-fury.3503700/
[18:52] <Zarator> Iron Sphere currently can take up to 4 updates
[18:52] <Zarator> just to get through it
[18:52] <Deck_Knight> Yes. It's looks like a huge slog. I also think it has more rooms than normal. Originally they were all the same *number* of encounters L > RP > RP > G > RP > RP > B, but the difficulty was ramped WAY UP for Ubers.
[18:53] <Zarator> yeah
[18:53] <Zarator> Personally, I think a good model should be
[18:53] <Zarator> Training: L > RP > G > RP > B
[18:53] <Zarator> Legendary: L > RP > G > RP > RP > B
[18:53] <Zarator> Uber: L > RP > RP > G > RP > RP > B, like the one you proposed
[18:54] <Deck_Knight> Sounds legit. It would also let there be a bit more freedom to make some of the RPs harder than they currently are.
[18:54] <Zarator> You can always trim down the backpack if you feel the nedd
[18:54] <Deck_Knight> When you assume 4 RPs it takes a lot of holding back if you actually want the Legend to be accessible.
[18:54] <Zarator> need*
[18:54] <Zarator> although I'm not sure it'd be needed
[18:55] <Deck_Knight> Probably not.
[18:55] <Zarator> Also I'd go as so far as to say that, IMO
[18:55] <Zarator> most if not all RPs
[18:55] <Zarator> should feature a battle
[18:55] <Zarator> that's what makes TLR fun
[18:56] <Zarator> an event like Clockwork Platform, IMO
[18:56] <Zarator> is just stupid and unenjoyable
[18:56] <Zarator> did you read it?
[18:59] <Deck_Knight> I like nightmares, but even that is a trap I would never envision. Mostly because it doesn't involve using a sinister combination of Pokemon, Item, and Trap Condition.
[18:59] <Zarator> Btw
[18:59] <Zarator> I also thing the abuse of <Ref's choice> in traps
[18:59] <Zarator> takes away from the fun of TLRs
[19:00] <Zarator> one of the most fun parts IMO is to try and game trap conditions
[19:00] <Zarator> if they're well thought (not just the simple *least HP*)
[19:00] <Zarator> it can really make the game more interesting
[19:00] <Deck_Knight> Doesn't sound like one of mine. I always specified some kind of High / Low HP / Energy / Speed condition.
[19:00] <Zarator> and restrict the team building choices further
[19:01] <Zarator> yeah
[19:01] <Zarator> I think it was a reaction to the "open-source" phase
[19:01] <Zarator> ppl were so scared about the entire idea of building a team for a TLR
[19:01] <Deck_Knight> Sounds likely.
[19:01] <Zarator> that they went over the top to make it impossible
[19:01] <Zarator> as the raid developer I find it kinda silly. You should go the other way around.
[19:01] <Zarator> They MUST bring the absolute best team
[19:01] <Deck_Knight> Lowest EN is probably the most daunting because support moves can eat in, and if you only have one supporter that's going to get trapped it can be havoc.
[19:02] <Zarator> or they're not even standing a chance
[19:02] <Zarator> Well it's an extreme but you got the idea
[19:02] <Zarator> Well
[19:02] <Zarator> Sometimes even *highest HP* can be particularly cruel
[19:02] <Zarator> since oddly enough
[19:03] <Zarator> it's harder to game than *lowest HP*
[19:03] <Zarator> WAY harder
[19:04] <Deck_Knight> The biggest problem is if we shrink the size and we have things like the room idea, then trainers can just avoid the rooms they don't want. Might just be a case where it gets balanced out like I did with the Guardians, where easier choices lead to a harder Guardian, etc.
[19:05] <Zarator> That's a possibility
[19:05] <Zarator> Arenas can be toyed around with, as well
[19:07] <Deck_Knight> In general I like it though because it means less work for all but the Pokemon I want to agonize people to get to,
[19:07] <Zarator> mm
[19:07] <Deck_Knight> I also think combined with the checkpoint idea, having the 2 RPs after Guardians makes sense.
[19:07] <Deck_Knight> For Legendary mons.
[19:08] <Zarator> yeah
[19:08] <Deck_Knight> I think the checkpoints should trigger at the beginning of the battle, so you can re-fight the Guardians or the Boss. For randomized guardians I'm not sure whether it should be forced the same or to re-randomize because you hoped you get a different pair.
[19:09] <Zarator> mm
[19:09] <Deck_Knight> Or maybe After Guardians, Pre-Boss. But the Guardians are the most likely pair to cause a wipe.
[19:09] <Zarator> yeah but
[19:09] <Zarator> Remember that they're gonna load the game as it was
[19:09] <Zarator> The Guardians should've done their job already
[19:14] <Deck_Knight> One of the things I do try to do with the traps is throw in a little havok against deliberate counterteaming, so you can't make a *perfect* team but you can make one reasonably suited to the task.
[19:14] <Zarator> yeah

 

[Dogfish44]

OK, this is a response from Dogfish44 and Its_A_Random in regards to Save Games in TLR and issues raised regarding TLR length.

Save Games:

Save games in TLR are a fundamentally smart idea. We will be implementing them on all new TLRs and will be using multiple save points, depending on the difficulty of a TLR.

Training Difficulty
Training Level TLRs will have a single save point, located immediately after the Guardian Battle. This means that we are considering the removal of the Lackey Encounter from Training Difficulty TLR's. All the Lackeys in these TLR's have done from experience is simply roll over and die with little gain for the referee with the odd success (Eternal Drifter's TLR's say hi here).

Legendary Difficulty
Legendary Difficulty TLR's will have two save points - one immediately after the Lackey Battle, and one immediately after the Guardian battle.

Uber Difficulty
Uber Difficulty TLR's will have several save points - one located immediately after all Lackey battles, one immediately after the Guardian battle and one located immediately before the boss fight.

Mechanics
Saves are automatic as soon as you pass a given point in any TLR. If a player fails to succeed in a TLR, whether that be by being KOed or by KOing the Boss, then they may revert back to any previous save point between where they failed and where their run last started. When you use a save point, you effectively restart the TLR from that point with all Rewards (Excluding Ref Payment), Pokemon stats, and Backpack set to that point. Any counters obtained, or Pokemon caught between the save point and where you reset from are discarded, and cannot be claimed unless obtained again. A particular Save Point can only be used once per run and if at a point in a run the player is KOed and has no Save Point to go to, then their run ends. A player can also choose to not use a Save Point if they wish to modify their team regardless.

As mentioned above, you may only revert to a checkpoint between your last starting point the point where your run would have ended. This means that if you go past the Lackey Save Point (for example) and the Guardian Save Point in your run before being KOed, if you revert to the Guardian Save Point then you will not be able to revert to the Lackey Save Point later on. However, if you were to revert to the Lackey Save Point and pass by the Guardian Save Point again, then you would be able to revert to the Guardian Save Point.

Length Related Concerns:

OK, let's set out some concepts. We can assume that at a reasonable speed for people living at antipodes that the ref can post every other day - we can't get much faster without enforcing a much harsher DQ on TLR, that with our reffing force is not feasible.

Let's say a TLR at a Training Level should aim to take one month to reach the boss. This is different than to catch the boss, since accurately predicting how long the capture takes is difficult. Let's say that a Legendary TLR should aim to reach the boss within 1.5 months, and two months is a solid aim for Uber TLR's.

Working from this, let's assume that Lackeys take three rounds. This is a high average but we can say that it is reasonably likely that the player, ordering second twice, can KO two or three generally weaker opponents. We can also use the same sort of logic to give the Guardians four rounds. We can then add one "round" to each of these to factor in the fact that a player is generally given time to set up their team after any previous events.

Let's take a one month Training TLR. Assumming 31 Days, there are 16 posts by the Ref in that time, and 15 by the player - one per day. Ignoring the opening post and the final post by the ref to enter the boss fight, that equates to 14 posts by the ref. As mentioned above, we are planning to remove the Lackey encounters from Training-Level TLRs. We can then remove five of these posts to set up the Guardians - one to post the Guardians when they appear, then four for each round update in the battle.

This means we have nine posts left for the ref to make. A Trap, Horde or Nest can all be expected to take three rounds of combat, with a single update to start it off. This means that each Combat RP Event can be expected to require four Updates. We can also add non-combat updates, which can be expected to take two to three updates to finish - One to set up and give the first branch of options, one to potentially give a second branch of options, and one to give the final result from the RP. This means that we can potentially squeeze in two Combat and one Non-Combat RPs into a Training TLR.

Update Schedule

Combat RP --> Non-Com RP (Single Multiple-Choice, 2 updates) --> Guards --> Combat RP ---> Boss

Day 1: TLR Posted
Day 2: Player Posts
Day 3: Combat RP Posted
Day 4: Player's Round 1 Orders
Day 5: Round 1
Day 6: Player's Round 2 Orders
Day 7: Round 2
Day 8: Player's Round 3 Orders
Day 9: Round 3 and Combat Ends
Day 10: Player heals team, advances.
Day 11: Non-Com RP Posted
Day 12: Player Acts
Day 13: Non-Com RP Results Posted
Day 14: Player heals team, advances.
Day 15: Guardians Posted
Day 16: Player's Round 1 Orders
Day 17: Round 1
Day 18: Player's Round 2 Orders
Day 19: Round 2
Day 20: Player's Round 3 Orders
Day 21: Round 3
Day 22: Player's Round 4 Orders
Day 23: Round 4 and Combat Ends
Day 24: Player heals team, advances, and saves
Day 25: Combat RP Posted
Day 26: Player's Round 1 Orders
Day 27: Round 1
Day 28: Player's Round 2 Orders
Day 29: Round 2
Day 30: Player's Round 3 Orders
Day 31: Round 3 and Combat Ends
Day 32: Player heals team, advances
Day 33: Boss Fight Posted

Thankfully, this means that TLRs can be shown to be somewhat modular in length. Lackeys can be treated like a Combat RP - they are often similar to nests in that sense, so they can have a block of eight days. Non-Combat with a single option set is a four day block, six days if two branches.

The above mentioned TLR Design:
Combat RP --> Non-Combat RP --> Guardians --> Combat RP ---> Boss

Will hence be the standard format for all Training-Difficulty TLR's.

Legendary TLR's will use the standard format, which is:
Lackey --> RP --> RP --> Guardians --> RP --> RP --> Boss

In order to reach the boss, using our above values and assumming four combat encounters, it should take 50 days at most. This is a wee bit above our aim of ~46 days but if one or two RP Sections are Non-Combat the difference is fine. Four Swords Quest in particular will be edited to fit this.

Uber TLRs will likely be longer and will be more fluid in length. That said, they will be built around aiming for anywhere between 60 and 64 days to reach the boss, which is potentially just two more battles.

Implementation of the above:

Implementing the above changes will take some time to retest stuff, redesign sections and the like. In particular, this will involve potentially modifying some RPs, and testing all of it.

We are also closing Four Swords Quest and Windswept Meadow effective immediately for rehauling, although current challenges in those TLR's (Frosty and Birkal's challenges) will be played to completion. Other TLRs will remain open during their revamps, including Mysterious Cove, Enchanted Meadow, Ruined Eden (Which is still being updated due to busy revampers), Timeless Tower, Black Sulphur Caldera, Glacial Cave, and The Planet's Fury.

So, at this stage we would like some feedback. Save Games will be implemented immediately, and we will give some time for comments to be made on updates to TLR Length before we begin the implementation. If there are any objections, please raise them or else all proposed changes in this post will be implemented.

Regards,
~Its_A_Random and Dogfish44

 

[Maxim]

Aw but I wanted my 10 battle Zekrom Uber dungeon to take people forever! :P

On a more serious note, I do like the changes here, but I just have two questions.

1. How do you intend to enforce this 33 day schedule? While part of the problem is the length of the dungeon, the other (and probably main) part of the problem is the ref and player speed. If we were to strictly enforce this it may help, but then, with the low amount of refs currently it may be silly to DQ them for not following the timeline.
2. More of a curiosity thing, why are the save points after the respective fight (aside from bosses in Uber dungeons)? In most circumstances, the Guardian fight is the most likely point where the player screwed up, or at least was dealt some damage that lead to the fall in the first place. For that matter I see little point in having a save point after the lackeys. Considering that you mentioned most lackeys end up not doing too much in most circumstances, it seems a little silly.

 

[Frosty]

While I kinda know the answer, let me dream ask.

Are Save points useable on current TLRs? In other words, once I lose to mankeys (I hate mankeys), can I go back to after the guardians? Or am I doomed to lose for have bothered to try out that (honestly) messy TLR? <_<

Also, this seems lovely. If there is any way I can help you out, let me know.

 

[Dogfish44]

Sure, I can field these.

Maxim:

1) The Schedule isn't to be enforced, but it's an example to show a decent TLR Length using the rules and objectives set out. Obviously refs might not be that fast (We will consider raising ref pay, although with our new ref force growing this may not be needed), and players may not be either, but with a schedule like the one shown it's feasible for a Training TLR to be finished within a 1.5 Month Timeframe.
2) Ease of position - plus, it means there is a challenge to reach with a new save point. It also means you don't have to repeat the second-longest fight of any TLR, the Guardians.

Frosty: Sorry, saves in new TLRs only. Your hope can be discarded into one of the portals to hell located at the left of the room. What, it's not like it's any good here...

 

[Frosty]

eh, I didn't expect anything else. Or else we would see a crapload of necrobumping. Just making sure.

I just suggest that the TLRs are adapted accordingly. Mystic Marsh at least begins to be hard AFTER the guardians, (hell, the stuff before is eh). Save Points before the shit starts to be thrown around, while helps, doesn't help as much as it should.

 

[Gerard]

Well, you also need to consider that saving lackeys means you don't have to wait in the queue again if you get haxed out of TLR

 

[Its_A_Random]

Many people are saying TLR still does not earn enough UC for the referee so I am going to attempt to address this with a proposed payout revision. The update based system has worked as intended and looks fine enough for use, so I am looking at the following at the moment:

2 UC Base
0.5 UC per Poké Ball thrown
1 UC per Non-Combat Update / "Free Round" following a capture attempt (Non-Combat as in introducing an encounter, scenarios, etc. Some standards on non-combats and shit to be clarified)
1.5 UC per Combat Update with three or less active Pokémon on the field.
2 UC per Combat Update with four to six active Pokémon on the field.
2.5 UC per Combat Update with seven or more active Pokémon on the field. (i.e. Compensation for Horde insanity).

My issue is trying to find a right balance so it is not too little and it is not too much. For example, I estimated Frosty's trip to southern Siberia to be worth ~83 UC (+32 over the current system). Of course the parameters can be tweaked around to get a good balance if that is the case.

Thoughts?

 

[Dogfish44]

I don't think that Frosty's run should be used owing to the fact that it was rather unique.

One thing that does need clarifying is how much an update where no combat occurs, but a ref issues actions, costs. Since right now, the interpretation that currently stands is that a trap setup where you issue orders for one Pokemon is the same value as a horde setup where you issue actions for 5. Which seems a wee bit silly =\