But USUM is good...
-
Welcome to Smogon! Take a moment to read the Introduction to Smogon for a run-down on everything Smogon, and make sure you take some time to read the global rules.
-
Congrats to the winners of the 2023 Smog Awards!
Unpopular opinions
- Thread starter antemortem
- Start date
That's only because SM was good (NOT great, but good). USUM barely added anything and on top of that sloppily wedged in new story elements (notably Necrozma & Ultra Recon Squad) which ultimately ended up messing if not ruining the original story. The post game episode with Rainbow Rocket was fun but at the same time, looking back and comparing it with the Ultra Beast Hunt, felt like shallow fan pandering that removed a better post game episode.
If Z was on the scale of B2W2 it would absolutely have saved Kalos. The main problem with the region is that the amount of content falls off so much after the 3rd gym, adding a few more routes/towns and a meatier postgame would have worked wonders. Although I guess I am in the minority here in that I find every pokemon game's story lackluster and am just as likely to button mash my way through the plot of XY and SM.
Honestly I do not think "Z" specifically was going to be a thing. I personally think that the Cells and 10%/Complete forms were thought up after they decided to not have follow-up titles and work on a new gen for the 20th anniversary instead. What little trace data is left in Gen VI shows some interesting things
-There are TWO unused games that, if you hack a Pokemon to be from them, both say they were caught in Kalos
-Both Thousand Waves and Thousand Arrows are in the coding of Gen VI
-There are 2 unused flags for Zygarde forms.
The main thing is Land's Wrath. It has the same power and accuracy as the Thousand moves, but has no additional effect. It's useless. In fact what would be the point of making not one, but TWO unused moves for one Pokemon, with the same stats as Land's Wrath outside of having secondary effects? I believe the original intent of them is that in the pair of Kalos follow-ups, Zygarde was going to get the Kyurem/Necrozma treatment and get two version-exclusive forms. For one Land's Wrath transforms into Thousand Waves, and for the other it transforms into Thousand Arrows.
Whether or not this follow-up pair was a sequel like B2W2 or an "Upper version" split in two like USUM is anyone's guess. But it would almost certainly not only allow the ORAS megas to be used in Kalos, but probably added new ones(The only ones I have any confidence in guessing are probably Slowking and Froslass, similar to how Gardevoir was in XY and Gallade was added in ORAS).
If I'd had to guess HOW early the follow-ups were scrapped, I would say at the latest it was sometime right before the development of the anime's "XYZ" season, due to the Zygarde cells being a major plot point in it.
Last edited:
Whenever anyone says "Z Version" I think they're using it as an umbrella term for whatever the follow-up to XY would have been. Whether it was a lone enhanced Z Version or a dual sequel XZ and YZ, people aren't concerned with what it was and more that we just never got it.
Navzyx-kun
Banned deucer.
barbaracle actually looks pretty good
It's definitely an interesting design (though I do feel a bit sorry for the Binacle acting as its feet), has a good Ability in Tough Claws, and good on the Physical side. Though what I think holds it back is its Typing and middling Speed (too slow normally, and I think over the threshold where it could take good advantage with Trick Room). It does get Shell Smash though, while it doesn't have the high defenses as other Shell Smash users, if it can get a few off it would be a pretty dangerous sweeper.
Barbaracle would be so much better with different abilities. It's current ones are pretty bad, being Sniper and Pickpocket, and the best one being Tough Claws. While I don't know what other abilities they could give it that would make sense AND be useful, I'm sure there are some out there.
Adaptability never hurts. Filter could help dull its weaknesses. Mold Breaker? No Guard?
Why give it filter when you could give it solid rock instead?
I think Adaptability would make sense, and also looking at other abilities i think Unnerve could be useful and makes a lot of sense when you look at it closely. Some other abilities that could be cool on it are Hyper Cutter and Defiant, both seeming to make sense due to just it in general. Also, Ironmage makes a good point in Solid Rock instead of Filter.
I mean they could always try to use Regional Variants as a way to fill in the gaps for those Pokémon if they want to do BW again. They seem to be using regional variants as a way to create new Pokémon but with also restraining themselves to go over the thousand mark, though I’m not sure what’s the point since they are going to be introducing new Pokémon anyway, and the 1000 mark will be reached within the next two generations anyway. Regardless, it seems that the way Regional Variants are handled is that they are mechanically new Pokémon, but are the same Pokémon due to name. That’s the vibe I get. A game like BW would require at least 150 Pokémon. That’s a lot, but assuming that 70-80 are new Pokémon, regional variants would be the remaining 70-80. A lot, but it does give opportunity for a more balanced distribution of regional forms for different Gens than before. Not to mention BW was hated on for using only new Pokémon, new regional variants would be a compromise, like: Here’s Galarian Mothim! It’s Mothim, but mechanically speaking it’s not Mothim if that makes any sense.
Speaking of Mothim, I like the concept of the Burmy line, even if I've never used it in-game. It expands upon the "regional caterpillar has branched evolutions" thing from Gen 3 in a way that the player has control over.
Tough Claws is good tho. Barbaracle just suffers from bad defensive typing and Base Stats that can't keep up with this crazy power creep.
Y'all wilding out here wanting to give Adaptability to a mon with 105 Atk and Shell Smash.
Barbaracle's problem, honestly, is just that by XY not one person was thinking "you know what we really need? Another Water/Rock type". At that point we already had Kabutops, Omastar, Corsola, Relicanth, and Carracosta. In fact, counting Barbaracle and Drednaw, we haven't received a new Water/Rock Pokémon in all of 2 gens: 4 and 7. After a certain point, people just stopped caring and weren't willing to give Barbaracle a fair shake without them doing something really novel and cool with it's design, and I can't really blame them. Especially because I think Binacle has one of the worst XY models (not designs, but models) and was a Pokémon suited to the 2D era more than the 3D one, which is unfortunate since it's never had and probably will never have a 2D sprite, and Barbaracle can't be caught in the wild so most people just skipped out on Binacle and never used it.
Speaking in terms of battle prowess, Barbaracle is actually the best Water/Rock Type Pokémon by a country mile. It's a really bad typing, and every Water/Rock Pokémon is currently ZU besides Barbaracle, who's NUBL (so, banned from NU for being too strong). Barbaracle's unpopularity isn't because it's weak, it's because of everything else.
Speaking in terms of battle prowess, Barbaracle is actually the best Water/Rock Type Pokémon by a country mile. It's a really bad typing, and every Water/Rock Pokémon is currently ZU besides Barbaracle, who's NUBL (so, banned from NU for being too strong). Barbaracle's unpopularity isn't because it's weak, it's because of everything else.
But Tough Claws is entirely useless for one of it's types, with none of the rock moves it learns being contact moves. Otherwise it is a good ability, but does restrict it in the moves it uses.
While I am on the topic of contact rock moves, the only contact rock moves are Rollout, Accelerock, and Head Smash, which Barbaracle has none of.
No contact Rock is unfortunate and all, but Tough Claws is still really good for Barbaracle and he has plenty of moves for it. STAB Liquidation and Razor Shell, Cross Chop/Low Kick/Superpower/Brick Break (how does he get all of these!), Dual Chop, Aerial Ace, and Poison Jab, with others besides. This ain't Sheer Force Braviary.
Barbarcle is a good Pokemon. You have to be more than just "good" to get in OU these days; you have to be exceptional or unique.
Barbarcle is a good Pokemon. You have to be more than just "good" to get in OU these days; you have to be exceptional or unique.
I think Gates to Infinity should've gone "all-out" and only had Gen 5 Pokémon. It would be cool to see what would fill the shopkeeper role, for example.
(Side-note: why do so many people think GTI only has Gen 5 Pokémon in it when Dunsparce is literally on the boxart?)
(Side-note: why do so many people think GTI only has Gen 5 Pokémon in it when Dunsparce is literally on the boxart?)
And it does not even have all Gen 5 Pokémon.
I looked at some of the Diamond and Pearl Beta Sprites which include some cut gender differences.
I am so glad most of these were cut. Female Charmeleon loses it's uniqueness of the evolutionary line as it's color matches Charmander and Charizard. That was my favorite thing about Charmeleon and why it's my favorite middle stage Pokemon.
And that may sound weird to some considering there are far worse designs for female Pokemon that could have been.
Only a handful of the current Gender differences I can tolerate. And female Wobuffet is I tolerate because it's that hilarious.
I am so glad most of these were cut. Female Charmeleon loses it's uniqueness of the evolutionary line as it's color matches Charmander and Charizard. That was my favorite thing about Charmeleon and why it's my favorite middle stage Pokemon.
And that may sound weird to some considering there are far worse designs for female Pokemon that could have been.
Only a handful of the current Gender differences I can tolerate. And female Wobuffet is I tolerate because it's that hilarious.
Yeah, a lot of the cut gender differences seemed to boil down to “take something on the Pokémon’s body and make it smaller on the female”, which was kinda lazy (not to mention it raised some odd questions when the shortened body part was the ears or something).
Also Charmeleon fan squad represent
Also Charmeleon fan squad represent
I would somewhat disagree.
In actual real nature, it isnt uncommon for the female (or, occasionally, the male) of a specie to just be smaller or have smaller parts.
Or rather, the opposite, the sex that actively competes for the partner (which is usually the males) tends to have flashy and bigger body parts they use to showoff in some way to show that they are fancier than the other males.
(No, not what you're thinking, you pervs :P )
So no, I wouldn't consider using a design that reproduces how real world looks "lazy". If anything, the only complaint one could really have is that they would have been trying to put realism in designs that are anything but.
Yeah, "some", as in most every single Pokemon which had genders, lol.
(FUN FACT: Psyduck's gender difference was female's hair were shaped like a heart)Lazy? Maybe a bit, though then again it's a proper representation of real life gender dimorphism where for many animals the main difference is usually in size. Though it's not always as cut and dry as "females have the smaller parts", they do consider real life animal counterparts and in species where the females have the bigger parts (for example, the bug world) the Pokemon of those species are given the bigger parts/males are shrunk so the female can be bigger.
(EDIT: Shedinja'd, but posting my thoughts anyway as I got more to say)
But that said, yeah, while a lot of these probably would have changed if they kept the idea of every gender having a difference (one horned female Charizard just doesn't look right; yes I know it's from an early promotional picture, there's a reason that's the only depiction of Charizard like that), I also agree that it wasn't needed for a lot of Pokemon if they couldn't think of a good difference (like the shorter ear Eeveelutions even if some of them look cuter with short ears). That said I do think they probably could have still had more gender differences, especially with the Pokemon who have a notable masculine/feminine appearance to give the opposite gender some bit of separation... oh, and wished they kept doing it after Gen IV.
I do agree that a lot of Pokemon don't need a visual difference, but one thing they could have done that would have made sense is make (depending on the species) one of the genders weigh more based off of real life, with an example being making female bug types heavier due to the larger size in real life. For pokemon like Eevee that looks somewhat like a dog, they could make males weigh more once again due to the fact that almost all male dogs are larger than females. It would be a cool easter egg of sorts, and would give you more reason to catch a certain gender other than breeding and the Ralts situation.