Resource Union Street - Casual Discussion Thread

if last order turns out unplayable in contests, we'll probably make the action count 3-2-2 for first-middle-last. the middle turn should be the worst possible place to be, design-wise.

don't expect this change until the event period ends, though.
 
Tool people might find useful.
its a modified version of the combo finder where you tell it what mon you want to know about at what level, and it tells you how many bs moves it has, and highlights them in green to make it easier to find them when first ordering.
1712691622538.png

Maybe you have different thoughts to me on what moves are important to know about.
To add a move put at the bottom of column f. To remove moves you don't think should be there delete them from column f.
1712691685378.png

It can also compare the move pools of 2 mons. Copy the values of cells g2-g7 into i2-i7 with ctrl+shift+v(to copy values not formula) and then find comboes for a different mon to see the difference in their move pools.
purple = its bs and only 1 of the mon has it
blue = its not bs but only 1 of the mon has it
1712691926792.png

To access the tool go to this google doc and copy the combo finder tab onto your version of the combo finder/profile maker.
 
I'm happy to read that self-reffing casual matches is possible again. Do any of you folks know whether there any changes to participant compensation/rewards from matches using this rule? Also, has double self-reffing returned as well, or just its more sightly relative?
 
in frankness i didn't get any internal feedback on self-reffing rewards, and overlooked how self-reffing would have to pay. i don't want people to be forced to never self-ref or only self-ref because of some surface reading of the pay. i can write that up shortly in the Tower OP.

edit: The tower rewards post should now properly support any number of self-refs in the same battle. the JC adjustments from the April patch should now properly be included, as well.

here's the old text of tower rewards, in case someone needs them.
Battle Tower Rewards
For battling in a casual match, each player will receive an amount of TC and RC as progress rewards, and will spend JC (regardless of progress).
  • :rare candy:TC: Smallest number of Pokemon sent out by a team + half the battle's Level
  • :amulet coin:RC: Smallest number of Pokemon sent out by a team + half the battle's Level + one (1)
  • :tea:JC: Each player will spend 2 JC, except for battles played with Beginner Rules.
    • When a player finishes a Beginner Battle for the first time, they are awarded 20 JC to get them started in earnest.
  • :exp share: Level: Each player may select one of their Level 0 Pokemon, whether or not they entered play, to promote to Level 1.
(Level 0 Pokemon can also be promoted by spending 1 TC in the Prize Claim thread.)​

For refereeing a casual match, the referee will receive RC and JC (but no TC) as progress rewards.
  • :amulet coin:RC: Smallest number of Pokemon sent out by a team + half the battle's Level + one (1)
  • :tea:JC: The referee will earn 2 JC, plus 2 more per battling player, to a maximum of 10 JC.
Previous Threads
Battle Tower Mk.I
Battle Tower Mk.II
Battle Tower Mk.III
Battle Tower Mk.IV
Battle Tower Mk.V
 
Last edited:
megas tier list lemme know what u think

s rank
:gallade-mega: (gallade) died 2024 / born 2015: welcome back razor claw gallade. pretty self explanatory, you are gallade and have enough stats to brawl with legends. also importantly very fast which is pretty crucial when you're fighting with nuclear powered mons. impish is 85/9/8 which is so annoying
:gardevoir-mega: (gardevoir) much more lopsided than gallade but who cares, you can wisp reflect teleport split in front of steels. hyper beam does positively unfair damage into anything you want to fight and you have a ton of tricks in case that doesn't pay off.
:kangaskhan-mega: (kangaskhan) fast, bulky, and you have broken ass power up punch and 3 good abilities. come in on anything heavy and click seismic toss to make your opponent cry. normal types are generally good in this cause of giga impact and hyper beam
:metagross-mega: (metagross) less nuclear than the others on this list but shuts down a whole bunch of shit with typing + 11 physdef. importantly lacks tricks so you can get caught sometimes but you have tough claws and coverage, youll be fine
:tyranitar-mega: (tyranitar) see metagross. you compensate for no tough claws with sand chip

a rank
:aggron-mega: (aggron) similar to ttar and metagross, annoyingly hard to kill cause of filter but no boosting ability and less coverage make it less threatening offensively, meaning the matchup into say special waters is pretty dubious
:altaria-mega: (altaria) less tricky than garde and a little weaker, but has one of the most obnoxious typings in the game and entirely shuts down stuff like zekrom. you can also click pixilate body slam which is very satisfying
:charizard-mega-y: (charizard y) you do nuclear damage with exactly fire. broken mon but you have to position him first and you trade into rock move clickers
:crucibelle-mega: (crucibelle) mg regen moldy with stealth rock and uturn is so heat. you click impish reflect in front of eq guys and come back later. crucibelle may be the best to ever do it
:garchomp-mega: (garchomp) obnoxious statline but you can wisp or ice move this guy and he isn't very good at escaping. has an advantage vs straightforward mons like groudon but struggles vs tricky mons like dusknoir. much better if you can reliably activate sand force
:gengar-mega: (gengar) stabs are a little weak, you can use tricks to beat some stuff but will trade into strong non-tc mons like entei or even gallade. good as a revenge killer in the patented role of kill a weakened guy then split on the next guy
:gyarados-mega: (gyarados) similar to chomper, you have tools like taunt and dont immediately die to any type but in return your stabs are a little weaker and you have a greater number of weaknesses. intimidate is annoying as hell just don't get uturned on
:heracross-mega: (heracross) similar to chomp and gyara, you have guts and strong stabs but you will run into resists (ghosts, birds, fairies) and have a 4x weak as well as fire fairy psychic weaknesses. best in formats like circuit where you can keep him in the back and bring him out at +2 atk
:latias-mega: (latias) 11/11 defenses with bold this is our screens supporter let's gooooooo
:lopunny-mega: (lopunny) fake out uturn giga impact encore cc twave and you have fucking cute charm. utterly ridiculous mon, looks fun as hell
:mawile-mega: (mawile) terrible speed and bulk but you have sixteen attack, great def typing, intimidate, sheer force, and pain split. beats all 5 of the s ranks but has mixed results against the rest of the game. a very matchup dependent mon that can lead to wonderful victories or terrible defeats
:medicham-mega: (medicham) you kill them but you resist nothing so if they aren't fighting-weak they can probably trade in return to at least some extent. recover is a really nice tool to have though
:rayquaza-mega: (rayquaza) 2 tc but its mega ray
:sableye-mega: (sableye) surprisingly this is only 80/9/10 with +spdef. you'll be fine though, this guy is the best pain splitter in the game and is also very good at clicking foul play screens and wisp
:salamence-mega: (salamence) probably best of the a ranks, does have to be positioned cause you're miserable into any flying resist but you have tools like fucking aerilate facade to beat most other stuff. truly insane if you come in with light screen to live ice beams, or moxie boost, or
:scizor-mega: (scizor) click uturn if the matchup is okay, click swords dance if it's good. doesn't die to anything except fire so you can do super well into a lot of stuff but you can get overwhelmed by special hits or tricks sometimes
:slowbro-mega: (slowbro) regen and you die to nothing physical ever
:steelix-mega: (steelix) aggron with stab eq and +1 spdef. water weakness is a pain but as previously stated aggron doesn't like facing waters in the first place, better matchup into the light ball crew is also appreciated. i wish sheer force did more for this guy, at least you can sf bulldoze into dragon dance to outspeed shit sometimes.
:venusaur-mega: (venusaur) dies to broken ass psychics but gets a billion moves and you can sleep powder anyone you disagree with

b rank
:aerodactyl-mega: (aerodactyl) you finish something off with a tc impact combo and trade off into the next guy while draining all their energy with pressure. a very mysterious pokemon that truly just dies sometimes but has a lot of weird tools
:ampharos-mega: (ampharos) this mon is very very annoying but the low speed really holds it back and allows most guys to trade into it. when i spend a tc i want to crush my opponent
:audino-mega: (audino) i swear this is good. weird moves + stab body slam and hyper beam/giga impact + screens + truly immense bulk + regen will carry through anything trust. notably has no pivot moves for regen so you need a chicken dancing teammate to make use of regen, but if you have that then you're chillin.
:blastoise-mega: (blastoise) see ampharos
:blaziken-mega: (blaziken) this would be really good if it was just a little bit bulkier. as is you send this and then they switch to their ground type to prevent you from getting too speedy and you're just like oh. still speed boost though so obv insane
:camerupt-mega: (camerupt) see ampharos, also 85/7/8 is not good bulk at all but the typing is pretty good
:charizard-mega-x: (charizard x) you feel like such a badass when you flare blitz into some shitty steel doing 200 damage but you feel like considerably less of a badass when you flare blitz into a neutral target like a conkeldurr and take more damage than you dish out. i can't explain why i find this mon as mediocre as i do, maybe i'm biased cause realistically it's a mixed attacker but i always feel so lame clicking special attacks as zard x
:diancie-mega: (diancie) i didnt know this fucker got baton pass, it seems that you can start with pomeg diancie and then bp some defense boosts out and then come back in and mega. fascinating. dont get me wrong this is alright, but theres a lot of like waters elecs ghosts psychics out there and those are just a pain for mega diancie. the mon isn't the best at winning neutral races especially against special attackers
:houndoom-mega: (houndoom) three other very good abilities save this from being worse zard y. gets some truly confounding moves such as charm, pain split, and spite. doesn't like having to get rid of pre-existing weather though and the fighting weakness is pretty annoying
:lucario-mega: (lucario) offensive typing and adaptability are premier, but other abilities are kinda whatever unless you can get justified to proc by baiting with a teleport psychic or something into the 1 dark type without pursuit. annoyingly frail and pretty poor against tricky guys but annihilates anything weak to its stab and is good at revenging a guy then gambiting into the next guy, allowing for a second guy to revenge that guy
:pidgeot-mega: (pidgeot) pretty simple pokemon, basically you click bold reflect into physical attackers then you hurricane then you hurricane some more. you win damage races with confusion damage and hyper beam. the no guard fly fix on tangled feet is cute but pidgeot isn't exactly exerting sub pressure
:pinsir-mega: (pinsir) demonic with backline moxie, unimpressive against any non flying weak guy otherwise. its a real shame this guy got moxie instead of something else cause an aerilate stealth rock guy is so cool
:sharpedo-mega: (sharpedo) you eat people and get faster
:swampert-mega: (swampert) this mon has a lot of good traits but i'm personally not a fan. a lot of fires and elecs will carry grass coverage, you die to burn, you're hella slow outside of rain, and a lot of waters (esp anything with scald) can contest you even in rain. if you try to play this like an early game pivot pert, the mega stone isn't doing much for you as you get chipped down by everything and are generally sad. swampertite is still worth carrying in the backpack imo cause this guy can be an asset sometimes just not all the time

c rank
:abomasnow-mega: (abomasnow) mon with some very funny traits such as being able to boost physdef to astronomical levels via snow + skull bash, autohit blizzard, sheer cold, light screen, etc. end of the day though you are still mega abomasnow
:absol-mega: (absol) gallade lost razor claw but absol still has it, and the mega is a bit unimpressive in comparison. bounce doesn't actually do a lot for you as you can't switch in on things and the best way to beat absol has always been to just hit it. i am however obligated to advertise that mega absol is the best overheal recipient (e.g. via healing wish) due to bounce + dark type conferring immunities to psychic noise and heal block, its propensity to boost with sd + justified, magic bounce shutting down roar and whirlwind, and it generally having a lot of attack and speed.
:alakazam-mega: (alakazam) this is always worse than lo zam unless you want to trace something funny
:banette-mega: (banette) msab but instead of being bulky and having bounce you have poltergeist and i guess like cotton guard and you can also speed control stuff. very cool mon but poltergeist is gonna be inconsistent into consumables and you need to make some big brain plays to make thsi mon work in general
:beedrill-mega: (beedrill) good if you can kill someone with fell stinger, otherwise suffers from weak stabs + dies to everything syndrome
:glalie-mega: (glalie) why did they make this guy mixed and mono ice. at least you got 9/9 and can remedy gamefreak's mistakes with -spa +def or some shit, spam spikes, and try to beat every physical attacker under snow like you're eiscue
:latios-mega: (latios) when do you ever use this over base latios
:manectric-mega: (manectric) at a glance this isn't very compelling compared to light ball users, except against aggressive item-removal strategies. lrod tbolt is as good as pidgeot hurricane, but the difference is that pidgeot (the goat) hits bugs grasses and fightings and manec only hits waters and birds. still if you see lead starmie or some shit go this guy and send your opponent directly to hell
:mewtwo-mega-x: (mewtwo x) 2 tc is almost definitely not worth for this guy, you resist like nothing and have no cool ability so you just slowly trade into stuff. still mmx is surprisingly chunky and can play around with moves like wisp into guys like mega metagross and gallade. massive respect for anyone who gets this guy and brings him to things
:mewtwo-mega-y: (mewtwo y) see above. obviously physdef is an issue but i'm a bold m2 advocate. mmx won't mind, he still has 12/11 offenses
:sceptile-mega: (sceptile) i originally made a bottom tier specifically for this guy but overgrow frenzy plant is really not the worst thing in the world. obviously needing to position a grass to get kills is extremely dubious, but you can also counterlead stupid fucking "unpunishable" rowap pert with your stab leaf blade for 26 damage. the good news is scept finally got pivoting in gen 9, the bad news is that it's shed tail. i might actually go get this mon just cause ive spent so much time hating on it lol
 
Last edited:
next season or gen: do we want to move back to Lv1-5 instead of 0-4.

is it more annoying to start from 0 or to redo your levels

Assuming nothing else changes, I like 0-4 a lot more than 1-5.
Level 0 isn't a real level, it's the tutorial level. Keeping it at lv0 clearly communicates it's a tutorial level, something to do to learn the basics of the game. If you pick up any game and see you start at Lv0 that pretty easily communicates you're in the tutorial and the "real game" begins at lv1. However, if you start at lv1 then you already kinda feel more "in the game" than if you were at lv0.

Compare saying "The real game begins at lv1, lv0 is just the tutorial" to "The real game begins at lv2, lv1 is just the tutorial". Lv2 being the first real one is a lot clunkier compared to lv1.


Similar thing for the upper bounds. People's brains like a few patterns - Numbers ending on 0, 3 and 5 are good places to stop for most things. They're satisfying numbers; 3 has the rule of three, 5 is how many numbers you can count in one hand and 10 is how many numbers you can count to with both. Yes I am aware there are ways to count above that with fingers but it's not a fundamental part of western society like counting to 5 or 10 is. They're numbers that people enjoy to be at.

So, if 3 and 5 is the place to stop, why stop at 4 rather than 5? Because it implies that, rather than 5 being the place to stop, 3 is the place to stop. Think of it this way: If 5 is the max level then that's the endgoal - that's where you beat the game. That's where you want your mons to be; it's the nice round number and not having your mons there will bug ya. Imagine having a bunch of level 4s and a few level 5s. Yuck, I have so many mons to bring to lv5!

Now, compare that to level 4 being the maximun. Here, 3 is the nice-to-stop-at number. 3 is the "Okay the mon is leveled up and ready to go" number, with 4 being the Completion: 101%, the "Let's push the mon beyond its limits". Postgame content, bonus content, stuff skippable. IE, stuff that won't bug you for not having. Seeing a bunch of lv3's and a few lv4 makes you think "Heck yeah look at all these strong pokémon I have! I even have some above lv3!"

Lv 0-4Lv 1-5
Understanding tutorial levelLv0 is clear to be the tutorial just by looking at the numberLv1 is not clear to be the tutorial
Understanding first content levelLv1 is clear to be the first real level of the gameLv2 is not clear to be the first real level
Feeling seeing their min level mons"Lv0 is the tutorial level; I should take it out of its tutorial limbo to put it into the real game, lv1.""Lv1 is the first level, I should bring it to content to level up" followed by being confused by there being no lv1 content
Feeling seeing their near maxxed mons"Lv3 is an aesthetically nice level to keep my mon in. My OCD is happy.""I am bugged that my mons are lv4 and not a more aesthetic number like 3 or 5. My OCD is angery."
Feeling seeing their maxxed mons"I am happy to have this Lv4 mon; it's a super cool endgame reward above the level of the usual mons; it feels great to level a mon above the usual stopping point""I finally maxxed my mon to Lv5. I can finally bring it to Circuit."
Bringing near maxxed mons to circuit"Lv3 is the usual stop number for Pokémon. It's not Lv4 but it's still good.""Lv4 is below the stop number; I am bringing a underleveled mon into Circuit"

To sum it up:
Lv 0-4Lv 1-5Stop Numbers
Lv 0/1Lv0: Clear as the tutorial, makes sense why there's no Lv0 contentLv1: Not clear as the tutorial, makes people wonder why no lv1 content.Lv 1-5, this is lv1
Lv 1/2Lv1: Clear as the first real level, this is where the game truly begins.Lv2: Not clear as the real start, people could think there's more stuff to do on the previous levelLv 0-5, this is lv1.
Lv 2/3Lv2: Clear to be the intermediate levelLv3: Not clear to be the intermediate level, looks like a stop numberLv 1-5, this is lv3
Lv 3/4Lv3: Clear to be a stop levelLv4: Not a stop numberLv 0-4, this is lv3
Lv 4/5Lv4: Max level, not a stop number so it's "Game Completion: 101%" reward, "above normally max power" level.Lv5: Stop number, making this the "natural" end.Lv 1-5, this is lv5

Essentially, in Lv 0-4 it encourages people to have mons at Lv1 and Lv3 while at Lv1-5 it encourages people to keep mons at Lv0, Lv2 and Lv4.

------

Having said that, can we get rid of that awkward moment after the first beginner battle where you have two lv1 mons and one lv0?
Make it so you can level all lv0 mons after a Battle Tower match rather than just one. That way all 3 of their mons gets brough to lv1, being able to play any and all content with their pokémon rather than having to do another awkward Battle Tower match in addition to saving them TC in the spot where TC is at its most valuable. It's essentially +2 starting TC but it does so much to streamline the new player experience it's insane it's not already a thing.

(If it leads to old players playing Lv0 beginner battles to save TC to level, make it so it only happens on the first beginner battle like the +20 JC injection)
 
Keep levels 0-4 please.
Maybe I am too programmer brained but I don't see a reason why 0-4 is worse than 1-5.
Otoh having to relabel everythings sounds awful. I would lose minutes of my time that could never be gained back.
(also it runs the risk of players trying to run content with mon that are the wrong level, or losing levels on their mon because they were not paying enough attention, like if someone played a few months ago and then returns in 6 months time and does not realise they were meant to increment every number by 1)
 
0-4 lvls in my opinion, as a new BBP player, help keep the feeling of BBP being it’s own game a lot better, and it makes you happy when you get to level one, because it has the feeling of your first pokemon game all over again
 
putting out mid-summer feelers (pseudopods) to see if we want to:
  • have"no combos" fall: setting all facilities and Circuits in sept-dec 2024 to "Combos: Off", to see if players find ordering on time any easier
  • give freeze a better job to do than "stun"
  • remove markers from the game
    • (everything that's currently a marker can either become a Condition or just be "noted" on objects, the way we do with stuff like Disable)
  • take a really hard look at Energy, which may lead to a rework of Energy as we know it
 
No Combos: No thank you. Combos are the best part of this game. I often wonder how to get Pokemon to implement a similar system, because it is really well done and is a highlight of BBP.

Freeze Rework: Impartial to this; maybe I am too inexperienced but I haven't seen freeze do much of anything, though I know it's effect. There are probably better or more entertaining strategies than focusing on freezing opponents. Maybe it could affect speed somehow, like a "slowing" effect.

Removing Markers: Just for the sake of it? This change would not be an overcomplication, because its just putting everything into the group of markers, but I guess the strategic implications are above my head for this potential change. I don't see why, and bc of that I guess I don't have a say about this one.

Energy Rework: If this gets changed, I hope its not on a whim. Energy is connected to basically all aspects of this game. If there's a BETTER way to implement Energy than we have now, sure I support implementing that. I don't see a current problem with Energy as it is now, and something something "if it aint broke don't fix it."
 
My thoughts on those are, in order:
  • I suspect IRL stuff plays much more into ordering time than combos do, or at least this is the case for me. Also I agree with Hyjack that combos feel like a core part of the system that makes the game engaging and more than just a stat check.
  • If you can make this work it would be interesting, Freeze as a stun has only ever been overtuned or useless.
  • This seems like a lot of work for no real payoff? Like it doesn't actually change how things play out, and I'm not convinced this would make anything simpler aside from maybe rules on pivoting/phasing?
  • This last one is the one I think deserves the most time/effort, right now it kind of feels like energy only really exists in Safari? I like the way you need to manage energy in Safari, but outside of that it's a complete nonfactor.
 
i should elaborate: i can't control IRL stuff to make people have more time to order. i *can* control BBP things to make ordering take less time.

If not combos, then something else has to change. I really do need to hear what takes the most time when ordering (from everyone, not just the first couple people to reply). else, we might not have any players come this time next year. All year we've struggled to have anything end in results other than DQ or forfeit.

(also, i'd disagree that "spending the most time with the Combo Finder" is a skill we care to measure)
 
Combo
  • I know one of my early thoughts when starting the game was "wow, this game is so complicated. Then someone decided that resolving 1 move was too easy, so they let you slap 2 together and have to play around that."
  • They are also heavily second order favoured for basically the same reason (ordering vs them as first order is both difficult and expensive in terms of sub count)
  • Over all I think changing/removing them could be good
Re new players I do think the biggest problem is reffing.
I guess one thing to throw out there is the vast majority of reffing I do is direct swaps with other players, which maybe is nice for the social aspect. The fact that you can only take things from the top of the queue greatly limits when I can do this. If you want to move the game more towards people trading instead of relying on currency to get things done maybe people should be allowed to take anything from queues?
Obvious possible downsides, someone could get repeatedly skipped if they don't take part in the swap system (especially people not on discord?), no one is going to get a doubles realgam reffed (I guess keen people could swap doubles realgams against each other)

Freeze
Why not. I am planning to use it in a safari with barometer a-9, but agreed it isn't particularly relevant atm even if it is not a burning issue.

Markers
Not a huge pain point, but it could be nice to clean it up. Agreed that having so many different ways of tracking info is a bit confusing

Energy
No real thoughts without knowing the potential changes. Honestly it seems to mostly do an ok job so far, but it is true that having no en would make reffing a little nicer. If there were no combos en might be too high to matter in most cases.
 
putting out mid-summer feelers (pseudopods) to see if we want to:
  • have"no combos" fall: setting all facilities and Circuits in sept-dec 2024 to "Combos: Off", to see if players find ordering on time any easier
  • give freeze a better job to do than "stun"
  • remove markers from the game
    • (everything that's currently a marker can either become a Condition or just be "noted" on objects, the way we do with stuff like Disable)
  • take a really hard look at Energy, which may lead to a rework of Energy as we know it

No combos: Sounds good. The way I see it combos take a relatively low amount of time of a match - ie, in a b6p3 match only at max 6 combos happen through the game. Despite that they take a disproportional amount of brain space, needing to think about your own combo potential and the opponent's combo potential in literally every order of the game, ordering first or second. The way I've played first order I made a plan, wrote down some orders then spent ~20-40 minutes looking at the combo finder for all the potential ways combos can fuck everything up then made some subs. It's pure busywork, the way I see it. It's a formality; I spend 30 minutes putting subs that say "don't combo!!!!" and then they say "ok I wont" and we do this literally the entire game. At this point removing the combos and saving everyone the half an hour every round would be great.

Freeze: No opinion.

Markers: That sounds really nice. A lot of BBP rulings is stuff that effectively do the exact same thing but have 2-3 different niche interactions; cutting down on stuff like this really really helps with learning the game.

Energy: Really like this. Keeping track of energy and always having to double check energy costs in the DAT is a rather time consuming stuff when reffing so it getting reworked would be awesome. [I already spoke at lenghts about energy so I won't go as in-depth here again]
 
Do people experience fomo about not playing in a given month's league circuit arena? About not playing in a given month's event? I never have and never considered that others might.

The intent with those is that there's variety from month to month, not that everyone is expected to do all of them. But if there is a large contingent of people who feel expected to do all of them, that is information that would be good for me to know.
 
For events, I wouldn't want to pass up the chance to get an exclusive mon, doubly so if it's good in battle. The ones that are just records I'm usually good to skip if I'm not feeling it.

If anything, a circuit arena has tended to make me less likely to want to join than more likely.
 
I agree with what Eve said that the rewards for events in question are more what causes fomo than the event itself. There are some exclusive mons that I don't really care for (like I didn't get fomo from not participating in Lance and trying to win a level 0 Dragonite), but if there's a chance I'll want to use the mon competitively then it's much more likely to kick in for me.

I have never got fomo from not participating in a League Circuit arena. Some of them are interesting changes, some aren't as much, but overall I've never found it to be a big deal if I'm not up to play in any given Circuit.
 
Back
Top