I originally posted this in C&C, but was told this is a better place for this kind of thread.
I think it's safe to safe I'm going to be referring to OU, which is considered the standard environment. I do feel that as the standard, it should be balanced so that OU rewards the smartest and most creative players. It makes it funner to play and funner to watch. I can really relate that fact to my longtime love, starcraft (fan and competitive player of broodwar since '03). Well pokemon and starcraft are two completely different animals, and are fun and competitive for a variety of reasons. It is much easier in pokemon to be creative and good, as with more generations, you really can't "know" the game as well as broodwar is known. As well as it should, considering why pokemon is fun to play competitively. The more knowledge you have about pokemon in general will naturally make you a better player. No one knows everything about pokemon, and they never will, so you can restrict your knowledge to what your team will consist of, which is generally the case with the 9 race match-ups in BW. You can't really be a top player and play more then one race, because there is too much information and practice required for one person to handle. And some pokemon are more popular then others, which will always be the case, so you tend to know more about Over-used pokes if you play OU. Since this is a fact, you can be rewarded with victory if you can suprise someone with something they havent seen. Creativity being rewarded here. A smart, knowledgeable and talented player will be more likely to know how to respond to this and standard situations. Rewarded! But I think it's not ignored that some pokemon are inherently more useful, more usable and more dynamic then others in the game. Certain pokemon will always be prevelant, and they have a direct or in-direct effect on the meta-game. (I'm not going to be talking about meta-gaming here, it's an over-used word and a beautiful thing, I have no problems with what it pertains to; it's what people do with the tools and resources they are given, which is why you can watch and learn from other players. Pokemon is too broad a game to limit this aspect of it, and if you don't like what people are doing, you need to find a work-around that plays to your strengths and knowledge, or maybe pokemon is not for you.)
The root of what you know about the game is assessing the factors it involves. The Pokemon battle system may not be perfect, but you can't really call something broken if no-one has found and abused what is imperfect to a level that you start looking for flaws in the game rather then flaws in the opponents. But if you'd be close-minded if this stopped you from speculating and theory-crafting! So I've done a fair share of that with this and want all the criticism you can muster! Believe me, I can take it, constructively and beyond.
As someone who has followed CAP for a bit, and generally become familiar with how the game is evolving on wifi, smogon and other battling simulators, I know there is a lot of controversy regarding tiers and such. I don't try to develop too much of a belief of how it should be, but I have opinions. I think it would be a little ignorant to say steel typing and offensively, dragon typing, do not massively impact the OU environment, for better or for worse depends on the person. Personally, I feel it constricts people from thinking outside the box, and doing so for good reason. You play to win, thats what competition entails. Is it the individual pokemon that restrict it? I don't think so, because pokemon can be subject to change, and are often under the magnifying glass for what they are capable of. I feel that GameFreak is aware of what makes a powerful, balanced and creativity-inducing pokemon. As e-sports and competition become a more prevalent thing (One day they will be huge, I feel), they will cater more and more to the competition base. (The term 'hardcore' and 'casual' feels out of place. Maybe it's a personality related, but that's not what I'm writing about)
Now, it doesn't seem that they are not capable of breaking the typing-mold, as we;ve seen with G/S/C, but I'm curious to see why not now with a lot of information available. Pokemon is meant to change and evolve(teehee), and I dont see why it cant here. Does typing involve some pokemon canon or lore that we can't deviate from with this? Does it have to make 'sense'? Well then I'd be force to emit a hefty lol. It's a fantasy game that plays on the imagination. It has a realistic element to it that lets us feel we can have 'our pokemon' and a relative attachment to what we make, but if one thing is certain about mankind, they can stretch their imagination to any limit, as long as you can imagine it. (I've always viewed the phrase "beyond your imagination" as a naive and stupid exaggeration when I was growing up. You can't tell me what I can't imagine!)
So I want ideas, not necessarily that make sense to us, but that make sense to the gameplay, and let those creative-based players get a little credit.
WE WILL EXPAND CREATIVITY WITH OUR CREATIVITY!
First let's think of things that existing types cover. Be creative, and don't be afraid to tread on other types toes. Hell there is ground and rock. And don't be afraid if it sounds stupid. Normal, fighting, ice and water? Dark, dragon ghost? When they cranked out that first r/b, they must have been on some great drugs, I want some of that.
Here I threw some together.
Plasma/Gravity/Nuclear/Chemical/Light
Now you can try to make it make sense in a chart, but i think you can find excuses for almost anything. Like would dragon really be weak to ice? Yet strong against water grass and electricity? IMAGINATION with no restraints. Just try to make it fair if you were actually going to make a pokemon that typing. If you make a typing too strong, who cares thats why ubers and stats exist, right? Factors are you're friends.
I'll give it a whirl, I'll use plasma, because that would be cool, then muk could be plasma/poison, because muk is cool.
I'll look at the type chart, and list everything I want plasma to be strong and weak to, offensively and defensively. I will mostly base it on what is prevalent to what I've seen in OU.
Plasma's attack-
Weak against Ice, grass, pyschic, rock
Strong against fighting, steel, ghost
Plasma's defense-
Weak to grass, poison, pyschic, ghost, dark
strong to fire, ground, rock, dragon
There, and if anything seems too farfetch'd, I'll make up a good reason. It nails those steelies in the ass, while giving those poor types a thumbs up.
What, strong against ghost but weak to ghost attacks? Haven't you ever seen ghostbusters?
TL;DR: Let's make types!
Criticize my ideas and the format. Criticize away.
I think it's safe to safe I'm going to be referring to OU, which is considered the standard environment. I do feel that as the standard, it should be balanced so that OU rewards the smartest and most creative players. It makes it funner to play and funner to watch. I can really relate that fact to my longtime love, starcraft (fan and competitive player of broodwar since '03). Well pokemon and starcraft are two completely different animals, and are fun and competitive for a variety of reasons. It is much easier in pokemon to be creative and good, as with more generations, you really can't "know" the game as well as broodwar is known. As well as it should, considering why pokemon is fun to play competitively. The more knowledge you have about pokemon in general will naturally make you a better player. No one knows everything about pokemon, and they never will, so you can restrict your knowledge to what your team will consist of, which is generally the case with the 9 race match-ups in BW. You can't really be a top player and play more then one race, because there is too much information and practice required for one person to handle. And some pokemon are more popular then others, which will always be the case, so you tend to know more about Over-used pokes if you play OU. Since this is a fact, you can be rewarded with victory if you can suprise someone with something they havent seen. Creativity being rewarded here. A smart, knowledgeable and talented player will be more likely to know how to respond to this and standard situations. Rewarded! But I think it's not ignored that some pokemon are inherently more useful, more usable and more dynamic then others in the game. Certain pokemon will always be prevelant, and they have a direct or in-direct effect on the meta-game. (I'm not going to be talking about meta-gaming here, it's an over-used word and a beautiful thing, I have no problems with what it pertains to; it's what people do with the tools and resources they are given, which is why you can watch and learn from other players. Pokemon is too broad a game to limit this aspect of it, and if you don't like what people are doing, you need to find a work-around that plays to your strengths and knowledge, or maybe pokemon is not for you.)
The root of what you know about the game is assessing the factors it involves. The Pokemon battle system may not be perfect, but you can't really call something broken if no-one has found and abused what is imperfect to a level that you start looking for flaws in the game rather then flaws in the opponents. But if you'd be close-minded if this stopped you from speculating and theory-crafting! So I've done a fair share of that with this and want all the criticism you can muster! Believe me, I can take it, constructively and beyond.
As someone who has followed CAP for a bit, and generally become familiar with how the game is evolving on wifi, smogon and other battling simulators, I know there is a lot of controversy regarding tiers and such. I don't try to develop too much of a belief of how it should be, but I have opinions. I think it would be a little ignorant to say steel typing and offensively, dragon typing, do not massively impact the OU environment, for better or for worse depends on the person. Personally, I feel it constricts people from thinking outside the box, and doing so for good reason. You play to win, thats what competition entails. Is it the individual pokemon that restrict it? I don't think so, because pokemon can be subject to change, and are often under the magnifying glass for what they are capable of. I feel that GameFreak is aware of what makes a powerful, balanced and creativity-inducing pokemon. As e-sports and competition become a more prevalent thing (One day they will be huge, I feel), they will cater more and more to the competition base. (The term 'hardcore' and 'casual' feels out of place. Maybe it's a personality related, but that's not what I'm writing about)
Now, it doesn't seem that they are not capable of breaking the typing-mold, as we;ve seen with G/S/C, but I'm curious to see why not now with a lot of information available. Pokemon is meant to change and evolve(teehee), and I dont see why it cant here. Does typing involve some pokemon canon or lore that we can't deviate from with this? Does it have to make 'sense'? Well then I'd be force to emit a hefty lol. It's a fantasy game that plays on the imagination. It has a realistic element to it that lets us feel we can have 'our pokemon' and a relative attachment to what we make, but if one thing is certain about mankind, they can stretch their imagination to any limit, as long as you can imagine it. (I've always viewed the phrase "beyond your imagination" as a naive and stupid exaggeration when I was growing up. You can't tell me what I can't imagine!)
So I want ideas, not necessarily that make sense to us, but that make sense to the gameplay, and let those creative-based players get a little credit.
WE WILL EXPAND CREATIVITY WITH OUR CREATIVITY!
First let's think of things that existing types cover. Be creative, and don't be afraid to tread on other types toes. Hell there is ground and rock. And don't be afraid if it sounds stupid. Normal, fighting, ice and water? Dark, dragon ghost? When they cranked out that first r/b, they must have been on some great drugs, I want some of that.
Here I threw some together.
Plasma/Gravity/Nuclear/Chemical/Light
Now you can try to make it make sense in a chart, but i think you can find excuses for almost anything. Like would dragon really be weak to ice? Yet strong against water grass and electricity? IMAGINATION with no restraints. Just try to make it fair if you were actually going to make a pokemon that typing. If you make a typing too strong, who cares thats why ubers and stats exist, right? Factors are you're friends.
I'll give it a whirl, I'll use plasma, because that would be cool, then muk could be plasma/poison, because muk is cool.
I'll look at the type chart, and list everything I want plasma to be strong and weak to, offensively and defensively. I will mostly base it on what is prevalent to what I've seen in OU.
Plasma's attack-
Weak against Ice, grass, pyschic, rock
Strong against fighting, steel, ghost
Plasma's defense-
Weak to grass, poison, pyschic, ghost, dark
strong to fire, ground, rock, dragon
There, and if anything seems too farfetch'd, I'll make up a good reason. It nails those steelies in the ass, while giving those poor types a thumbs up.
What, strong against ghost but weak to ghost attacks? Haven't you ever seen ghostbusters?
TL;DR: Let's make types!
Criticize my ideas and the format. Criticize away.
