Unpopular opinions

[Karxrida]

It once took me a week to get a 5 IV Clefairy with Unaware.

Fuck the RNG. Hacking is not lazy when the alternative isn't even completely in your control. Give me a legitmate method to alter IVs and I will use it instead of resorting to Powersaves to bypass bullshit.

 

[Gabe]

It took me literally 3 months to get a pentaperfect Pokemon with a 6 IV Ditto and 5 IV parent. And such a long spread has occured for several of my breeding projects. There have also been several instances of two 6 IV parents trying to get a 6 IV child that takes more than a month. If it only ever takes you an hour, good for you. But for a lot of us, it takes a lot longer.

Plus that isn't including the OTHER five Pokemon for a team, plus the training and getting the items, some of which being BP items only...

Yeah. It takes a lot longer to get a team.

The game makes this so easy with everyone and destiny knot that I have trouble believing this.

Especially on Smogon, where people give free stuff all the time it's really not difficult to breed flawless Pokemon.

 

[Oriolous]

The game makes this so easy with everyone and destiny knot that I have trouble believing this.

Especially on Smogon, where people give free stuff all the time it's really not difficult to breed flawless Pokemon.

Even with Destiny Knot, it is still up to chance if you get your 5 correct IVs. Sure, Destiny Knot guarantees 5 IVs get passed down, but there is no guarantee it is your 31/x/31/31/31/31 or 31/31/31/x/31/31. Or god forbid you're trying to get a 6IV HA. And the chances go even lower if you don't have a perfect parent set.

And may the gods have mercy on your soul if you're going for HP Ice or Fire or something. It takes even longer for that.

 

[Gabe]

Even with Destiny Knot, it is still up to chance if you get your 5 correct IVs. Sure, Destiny Knot guarantees 5 IVs get passed down, but there is no guarantee it is your 31/x/31/31/31/31 or 31/31/31/x/31/31. Or god forbid you're trying to get a 6IV HA. And the chances go even lower if you don't have a perfect parent set.

And may the gods have mercy on your soul if you're going for HP Ice or Fire or something. It takes even longer for that.

You guys realize many kind users on the wifi sub forum give away flawless and hidden power dittos right?

My point is that with destiny knot it's extremely easy to breed flawless Pokemon, especially simple quint flawless spreads.

 

[Kurona]

If they move a Pokémon to a significantly earlier point in the game than was previously obtainable, they should lower the levels of evolution.
For instance, Psyduck. In Gen 1 it was obtainable by surfing; so it was around level... 20; 25 at the lowest? So it's evolution level being 33 made sense.
But come Gen 4 where you could obtain it early at Level 5. This makes it's evolution level of 33 much more gruelling... it'd make more sense progression-wise if it's evolution level for that game was changed to, say, around 25.

 

[thdhted]

When it comes to breeding, I don't find it very time consuming to get perfect IVs/natures thanks to an army of Perfect IV dittos, and can get it done within a few hours depending on what's being bred, but when it comes to getting HPs? Screw that, I'll use the powersave. But when not needing an HP? Breeding is just fine with me.

 

[Alg]

If they move a Pokémon to a significantly earlier point in the game than was previously obtainable, they should lower the levels of evolution.
For instance, Psyduck. In Gen 1 it was obtainable by surfing; so it was around level... 20; 25 at the lowest? So it's evolution level being 33 made sense.
But come Gen 4 where you could obtain it early at Level 5. This makes it's evolution level of 33 much more gruelling... it'd make more sense progression-wise if it's evolution level for that game was changed to, say, around 25.

Kalos really showed how inflexible this could be with earlygame Mienfoo and Rhyhorn and the like. Mienfoo's evolution in particular was a stretch even when you encountered it in the mid-30s and had Audino to carry it along the rest of the way.

 

[Kurona]

Kalos really showed how inflexible this could be with earlygame Mienfoo and Rhyhorn and the like. Mienfoo's evolution in particular was a stretch even when you encountered it in the mid-30s and had Audino to carry it along the rest of the way.

Mm. I think in general some evolution levels are a bit ridiculous and should be lowered regardless of what point in the game they're obtained; like Pawniard and Rufflet. I think I have said this specific one earlier in the thread, though...

 

[Pikachu315111]

Gabe:
Still, would it hurt to maybe include a way to raise a Pokemon's IV (and change its Nature)? What if you get a Pokemon that's nearly perfect but its a few IVs off or the wrong Nature? If the player really wants to be competitive they have to discard that Pokemon and try again. Also this could allow in-game teams or that Shiny you were lucky to get to maybe become competitive (not to mention Legendaries which you can't breed and Pokemon you get from Events). Like what if you could go to someone, say a new feature for the IV Checker, who can raise a single Pokemon's IV by 1 point once per day or costs a lot of pokedollars to do? Therefore you can either choose to keep on breeding which would be quicker though more tedious feeling, or you can just wait once a day and/or pay a lot of pokedollars to do but you don't have to go through the grind.

Kurona:
That's an interesting idea, at least for Pokemon in the Regional Dex. But what about the National Dex? While I always did think some Pokemon needed their evolution level changed, what you brought up has made me wonder whether the level evolution mechanic shouldn't be redone to make it more flexible. Like maybe have a mechanic that the more you use the Pokemon the more earlier it'll evolve.

 

[Oriolous]

You guys realize many kind users on the wifi sub forum give away flawless and hidden power dittos right?

My point is that with destiny knot it's extremely easy to breed flawless Pokemon, especially simple quint flawless spreads.

I have a 6 IV Ditto for almost every viable nature and a hexa30 Ditto for Hidden Power. Does it make it any less up to chance to get what is necessary?

Again, I point out it took me 3 months to breed a pentaperfect Arbok with a 6 IV Ditto and 5 IV imperfect parent. And a month for a Bisharp. And 3 months for a 6 IV Shiftry. Not everyone has the luck needed to get a perfect Pokemon in an hour.

And you're still ignoring the fact that it is still super timeconsuming getting all 6 team members AND train them AND level them AND getting items that might be BP only items.

That is still 8 hours or more per team from scratch. Even with the "hour a Pokemon" you claim.

 

[Gabe]

I have a 6 IV Ditto for almost every viable nature and a hexa30 Ditto for Hidden Power. Does it make it any less up to chance to get what is necessary?

Again, I point out it took me 3 months to breed a pentaperfect Arbok with a 6 IV Ditto and 5 IV imperfect parent. And a month for a Bisharp. And 3 months for a 6 IV Shiftry. Not everyone has the luck needed to get a perfect Pokemon in an hour.

And you're still ignoring the fact that it is still super timeconsuming getting all 6 team members AND train them AND level them AND getting items that might be BP only items.

That is still 8 hours or more per team from scratch. Even with the "hour a Pokemon" you claim.

There is no mathematical way it took you that long with those parents if you used destiny knot and ever stone unless you hatched one egg a day during that time.

This is such bs. Ev training with pokerus + power items + hordes takes 20 minutes and that's being generous. This is a huge exagerration of the game's tediousness. I bred 8 flawless Pokemon just last night.


Also, uhh YES. Using high IV parents significantly boosts your chances of having an egg with high IVs.

 

[Lady Vader]

I have a 6 IV Ditto for almost every viable nature and a hexa30 Ditto for Hidden Power. Does it make it any less up to chance to get what is necessary?

Again, I point out it took me 3 months to breed a pentaperfect Arbok with a 6 IV Ditto and 5 IV imperfect parent. And a month for a Bisharp. And 3 months for a 6 IV Shiftry. Not everyone has the luck needed to get a perfect Pokemon in an hour.

And you're still ignoring the fact that it is still super timeconsuming getting all 6 team members AND train them AND level them AND getting items that might be BP only items.

That is still 8 hours or more per team from scratch. Even with the "hour a Pokemon" you claim.

1) Poké Bank is your friend when it comes to BP.
2) It still doesn't take that long to get BP through the Maison.
3) It took me about 6 hours to breed and train a perfect Rotom-Wash and that was getting it to level 100. It took me a day to breed and train all six members of my Kanto Classic team.
4) Again, the odds of you taking 3 months is so astronomical that you must have the worst luck of all time.

 

[Oriolous]

There is no mathematical way it took you that long with those parents if you used destiny knot and ever stone unless you hatched one egg a day during that time.

This is such bs. Ev training with pokerus + power items + hordes takes 20 minutes and that's being generous. This is a huge exagerration of the game's tediousness. I bred 8 flawless Pokemon just last night.


Also, uhh YES. Using high IV parents significantly boosts your chances of having an egg with high IVs.

Alright, I'm dropping the subject now. Clearly there is no possible way anyone could be soooo unlucky when it is still possible for the 1/32 stat average (not even including correct abilities) to be just that. An average. That people can go either super above average or super below average. Oh, I'm just the only person to EVER get fucked by the RNG in this game when it comes to breeding. Even shiny hunters aren't as unlucky as I am trying to get their perfect shiny.</sarcasm>

1) Poké Bank is your friend when it comes to BP.
2) It still doesn't take that long to get BP through the Maison.
3) It took me about 6 hours to breed and train a perfect Rotom-Wash and that was getting it to level 100. It took me a day to breed and train all six members of my Kanto Classic team.
4) Again, the odds of you taking 3 months is so astronomical that you must have the worst luck of all time.

Oh, yeah. I have absolute shit luck. It pisses me off when I start a new breeding project and I complete it in less than a day and another project takes a week or several months (such as Arbok and Shiftry).

 

[Xen]

Just throwing it out there, but Time Machine breeding (basically pseudo-RNG abuse for eggs) helps a lot with breeding Pokemon with very specific spreads (such as Hidden Power). If you have a way to backup/restore saves, like with Powersaves, then you can simply reload said save, send in the proper parents via Pokemon Bank, and breed a desirable baby in a single egg. If you can't backup saves, then you're better off just mass-hatching if you're aiming for a 5 IV egg, but it still is something to look into if you're aiming for 6 IV eggs or Hidden Power spreads.

But anyway, Gen VI breeding is super-easy, and hoards + Blissey Bases/Restaurant Le Wow makes it easy to train hatchlings too.

/me still remembers the days of Gen III/IV breeding without RNG abuse, and shudders at the thought.

 

[Karxrida]

The fact you can get unlucky and waste loads of time because the RNG hates you is still stupid. There is no good reason for Game Freak to not try and fix this when they are willing to make EV training a bit more transparent with Super Training.

Just throwing it out there, but Time Machine breeding (basically pseudo-RNG abuse for eggs) helps a lot with breeding Pokemon with very specific spreads (such as Hidden Power). If you have a way to backup/restore saves, like with Powersaves, then you can simply reload said save, send in the proper parents via Pokemon Bank, and breed a desirable baby in a single egg. If you can't backup saves, then you're better off just mass-hatching if you're aiming for a 5 IV egg, but it still is something to look into if you're aiming for 6 IV eggs or Hidden Power spreads.

But anyway, Gen VI breeding is super-easy, and hoards + Blissey Bases/Restaurant Le Wow makes it easy to train hatchlings too.

/me still remembers the days of Gen III/IV breeding without RNG abuse, and shudders at the thought.

At that point if you have to use a Powersave anyway, might as well IV edit and skip the entire thing. It's not like the hack checks are that great (remember the Dream Ball Aegislash at VGC?)

 

[Kurona]

I kind of regret starting this argument...
Alright, well, new unpopular opinion - I really don't care what method you use to get competitive Pokémon. You like breeding for IVs or other legit ways? Cool. You can't be bothered with that and use hacks? Cool. In the end, it doesn't really matter - you both have legal competitive Pokémon that you can fight with and really who cares how you got it, you can still fight. Isn't that kind of the point? You don't really have the right to tell someone their method is wrong when they're doing nothing wrong and I kind of doubt either one of you is gonna convince the other. Just have fun and battle imo

 

[Xen]

The fact you can get unlucky and waste loads of time because the RNG hates you is still stupid. There is no good reason for Game Freak to not try and fix this when they are willing to make EV training a bit more transparent with Super Training.


At that point if you have to use a Powersave anyway, might as well IV edit and skip the entire thing. It's not like the hack checks are that great (remember the Dream Ball Aegislash at VGC?)

You could, but obviously some people will look down on if you battle with them, and even moreso if you trade them. It's a moral issue.

Also, that guy (was it Rizzo? idr) ended up getting disqualified for that Aegislash.

Guess my primary point is, yeah RNG can be a bitch, but breeding now has been a helluva lot easier than it used to be; Game Freak has tried to make breeding easier and more fair. Considering their track record, I'm sure their will be some more improvements later down the line in the future as well (Possibly S/M)

 

[Oriolous]

I kind of regret starting this argument...
Alright, well, new unpopular opinion - I really don't care what method you use to get competitive Pokémon. You like breeding for IVs or other legit ways? Cool. You can't be bothered with that and use hacks? Cool. In the end, it doesn't really matter - you both have legal competitive Pokémon that you can fight with and really who cares how you got it, you can still fight. Isn't that kind of the point? You don't really have the right to tell someone their method is wrong when they're doing nothing wrong and I kind of doubt either one of you is gonna convince the other. Just have fun and battle imo

That's my whole thing. As long as your Pokemon are legal and CAN feasibly happen, idgaf how you got it.

This is especially true for Hidden Powers and legendaries.

 

[Pikachu315111]

You could, but obviously some people will look down on if you battle with them, and even moreso if you trade them. It's a moral issue.

Also, that guy (was it Rizzo? idr) ended up getting disqualified for that Aegislash.

Someone submitted a Aegislash in a Dream Ball (a Pokeball you can only get in Gen V... for Dream World Pokemon) into the VGC? He wasn't disqualified because his Aegislash had perfect IVs, he was disqualified for being an idiot/showoff.

Anyway, when you bring official tournaments into this that's where it gets into a grey area. On one hand its an official tournament where most likely at least one person did things the official way, so therefore you also should do things the official way. On the other hand, if the hacked Pokemon is all legal (and not Shiny, because really?) then what's the difference? It's a grey area and if anything more of a reason GF should try to create a better way to raise a Pokemon with perfect IVs. I mean honestly, besides kids who won't be winning, who's entering competitions with Pokemon that don't have perfect IVs (or 5 perfect IVs and another stat with imperfect for Hidden Power)?

 

[flargananddingle]

That's my whole thing. As long as your Pokemon are legal and CAN feasibly happen, idgaf how you got it.

This is especially true for Hidden Powers and legendaries.

Devil's advocate here but: do you care why a baseball player can hit a 450 foot homerun?

Why go through all the tedium of practicing when you can just use steroids?

TPCI wants VGC to be an e-sport, while hacking is usually ignored (like steroids in the 90s), they still want there be more to it than someone handing you a team. The overarching theme (bonding, training all that) caters more to keeping the mechanics the same. The concept of "individual values" is there because they don't want everyone to use the same pokemon.

Disclaimer: I really dgaf if you hack, just don't try to trade it to me for something I put a lot of time and effort into

 

[Xen]

Modifying Pokemon is a big moral issue if you bring multiplayer into the equation, and everyone's gonna have a different stance on it. I personally don't really care about battling edited Pokemon, as long as their stats, abilities, etc. are all stuff that are possible to acquire legitimately (no Pokemon with illegal abilities/EVs for example); idgaf if they were edited to have flawless IVs, or to be Shiny. The only thing that matters in battle is the trianer's ability to play, not the Pokemon itself. Trading is an entirely different ballgame though; If I go through the trouble of breeding/SRing a Pokemon to trade, I expect others to trade me Pokemon that were also acquired through the work, not hacks that were created with a few mouseclicks that may or may not get me kicked out of a tournament.

Point is, editing vs breeding/SRing is a subject that each individual will feel differently about. And carrying on about the subject won't lead anywhere except flame wars & arguments. Probably best to leave it at that.

 

[Oriolous]

Devil's advocate here but: do you care why a baseball player can hit a 450 foot homerun?

Why go through all the tedium of practicing when you can just use steroids?

TPCI wants VGC to be an e-sport, while hacking is usually ignored (like steroids in the 90s), they still want there be more to it than someone handing you a team. The overarching theme (bonding, training all that) caters more to keeping the mechanics the same. The concept of "individual values" is there because they don't want everyone to use the same pokemon.

Disclaimer: I really dgaf if you hack, just don't try to trade it to me for something I put a lot of time and effort into

Even with the Pokemon I have that I know are hacked, I still bond with them through battles. It's a bit odd.

But if it is for an official tournament and stuff, I mean yeah, do things the legit way.

However, your point is still there and acknowledged.

 

[Adamant Zoroark]

You could, but obviously some people will look down on if you battle with them, and even moreso if you trade them. It's a moral issue.

Also, that guy (was it Rizzo? idr) ended up getting disqualified for that Aegislash.

Guess my primary point is, yeah RNG can be a bitch, but breeding now has been a helluva lot easier than it used to be; Game Freak has tried to make breeding easier and more fair. Considering their track record, I'm sure their will be some more improvements later down the line in the future as well (Possibly S/M)

The point is, the hack check (iirc VGC uses the same hack check as Battle Spot) should have caught the illegal ball, but apparently didn't. A human judge was required to check for the ball edit when Game Freak's hack check should have caught it.

 

[Norne]

People complaining about breeding, get an hp ice Pikachu with lighting rod Naive nature and hp ice. Now tell me how hell feels like sisyphus.

And then there is the fact that you would love to have an extreme speed Naive Ha volt tackle Pikachu with HP ice, icicle crash or surf...screw event only moves...

 

[stage7_4]

Devil's advocate here but: do you care why a baseball player can hit a 450 foot homerun?

Why go through all the tedium of practicing when you can just use steroids?

TPCI wants VGC to be an e-sport, while hacking is usually ignored (like steroids in the 90s), they still want there be more to it than someone handing you a team. The overarching theme (bonding, training all that) caters more to keeping the mechanics the same. The concept of "individual values" is there because they don't want everyone to use the same pokemon.

Disclaimer: I really dgaf if you hack, just don't try to trade it to me for something I put a lot of time and effort into

While I agree that it's unfair to use hacks in official tournaments simply because not everybody has access to them, there's a gigantic difference between physical sports like baseball and pokemon or chess. You see, physical sports test and athlete's natural strength and endurance and skill, so use of performance enhancers creates an uneven playing field in addition to unnecessary health risks.

But in pokemon or chess, the quality being tested is just your own mind, tactics, and a little bit of luck. So your pokemon's stats and IV's are not the result of hard work but more a threshold bar that needs to be met just to have an even playing field. They are not the goal of the competition... so why create this "stat barrier" with them? It would be like playing chess with one pawn not being able to move two spaces on the opening turn just because you didn't grind for two weeks before the competition.

Plus it would be a bit hypocritical to be completely against hacking on a board on Smogon, since Pokemon Showdown is essentially a hack tool given to everybody for the sole purpose of unofficial casual battling. Well, casual battling that is anything but casual.

Again, with hacking in VGC or anything official, it needs to be all or nothing: an even playing field. Either it's legal and everyone comes with perfect stat pokemon, or it's not and only the winners come with perfect stat pokemon.

...wait, that came out wrong.