Hello guys, I had an idea for a metagame called Spellmons
Premise: The letters of a Pokemon's name, its abilities, and moves add letters to a goal. These will be added simply upon being on the field. A goal is reached once all 26 letters have been achieved. At that point the opposing side will take 50% of their health at the end of the turn. The goal will then reset. What this will allow is another layer of Pokemon battling that hopefully meshes well.
Jellicent
Ability
: Water Absorb
Moves
: Hex, Scald, Will-o-Wisp, Recover
Letters added when Jellicent is on the field: a, b, c, d, e, h, i, j, l, n, o, q, r, s, t, v, w, x
Quagsire
Ability:
Damp
Moves:
Mega Kick, Infestation, Haze, Icy Wind
Letters added when Quagsire is on the field: a, c, d, e, f, g, h, i, k, m, n, p, q, r, s, t, u, w, y, z
This means the goal is completed by switching Jellicent with Quagsire. On the opposing side 50% health damage will be dealt at the turn's end.
Here's a few examples of complexity this can achieve:
A strategy for example would simply be switching in and out Pokemon to have your counter go up. Whittling the opposing team down as its possible to have the counter achievable with a single switch. A standard of this would be to have mons with unique lettered names and abilities with protect and switch between them to have the letters reach the goal. Then on the turn of the goal, protect or dish out an attack. Keeping in mind the weakness that the opposing Pokemon has would determine whether you dish out an attack to KO the opponent or be on the safe side with protecting and getting chip damage.
An alternative approach would be trying to set up on those with gimmicky teams that aren't strong and responsive to threats. Such as setting up on a mon and plowing through a team inefficient enough to deal with it. If a weaker mon tries to protect or switch then you can have Urshifu who ignores protect with Wicked Blow and has drain punch to restores its health or Kommo-O with clangorous soul and drain punch to sustain and sweep through a team.
Additional strategies include Mean Look, to stop a Pokemon from getting their letters and then switching around or having a Pokemon with finishing letters of a goal that can nuke the opposing side on the turn the other takes 50%,
If the damage output of achieving the goal is wrong in theory then I'm curious to hear. Is it too high or is it too low? Anything outside of a OHKO would be an arbitrary number but I thought 50% would be a transformative enough value. Again this is the idea at its earliest stages so there's a lot that can be changed.