Could POKEMON BATTLES be better?

[@krzysztofprucnal1820]

personaly i dont like those changes 1. attack an sp. attack you deleted those stats so this system only relies on moves base power and i think this creates a problem for example lets look at blacephalon. this pokemon is a glasscannon that has high special attack, phisical attack and speed but you removed those stats so now other fire types have same fire power and more bulk also they have same speed you can give it sa perk but it complicates whole proces. 2. speed if you add new system now pokemon like pyukumuku have 0 stars tyranitar has 1 zapdos has 2 and dragapult has 3. it sound good on paper but there is pokemon like garchopm who has base speed which is very important beacose it can outspeed a lot of pokemons like salamance, mew, volcarona, zapdos, jirachi, flygon the list goes long but now it speed ties with them or even it loses but if you give garchomp 3 stars this is unfair for example for weavile who normaly easly outspeeds it 3. moves i think now with investing in moves you rewords pokemon like dracovish and urshifu-s thoese mons mainly clic one move and other mons that need a lot of coverege you downgrade their power 4. pokemon with those changes i think you are killing some fun strategies like sub dd dragapult Dragapult @ Leftovers Ability: Clear Body EVs: 248 HP / 252 Atk / 4 Def / 4 SpD Jolly Nature - Substitute - Dragon Dance - Dragon Darts - Phantom Force with this set dragapult is still fast thanks to jolly it can even out speed raichu still has great offensive capabilities also it can set up more easli thanks to higher hp i dont think in your system something like that is possible 5. pokemon learning more than 4 moves with this change pokemon that are allready on the top are even greater like landorus-t normaly you have limits of what your sand tiger can do so it has a lot of difrent sets and a lot of difrent moves like u-turn eq toxic stealth rocks knock off explosion stone edge imprison defog smack down superpower and you want to throw every thing into one set there are olso mons like jolteon that have only 5 good moves 6. def and spd why would you change that you can just keep it like you kept hp 7. you didnt make less grind now we need to breed to find best ivs and train evs in your version we need to serch for good distribution of stars and make long and boring quest to get more tokens i my oppinion it feel like nothung changed i also think now in sword and shield its really easy to make competetive pokemon remomber how hard in was in bw/bw2 or dpp sorry for my bad english still realy cool video

[@finaslo]

Underrated comment. Everyone act like this system is really good and fun but it turns pokemon into a guessing game. Now you need to predict what moves/abilities they invested in which is not limited to 4 now. Also, because there's no physical/special attack stat, alakazam can throw powerful ice/fire punches and machamp can use powerful special attack which doesn't make sense

[@artist0154]

I think you didnt pay attention, there is no EVs or IVs, stars will always be the same So with this you dont need to grind for "a good distribution" if you want a better move in your pkm just use it Strategies are not gone, you can improve you pkm moveset but now everyone will have a different dragapult with their own passive and moves He kept speed stat just in the form of a passive abilitie, you want your garchomp to be faster, you can but forget about rough skin you have to choose

[@artist0154]

​@@finaslothats good, pkm is already a guess game, and logic is not a part of it, Alajazam already throws headbutts so a punch is no different, alittle bit of chaos and less perfect team optimization makes the game fun

[@enderluckjarmg985]

​@@artist0154 What kind of larp your Alakazam doing headbutting mons ⁉️

[@artist0154]

@@enderluckjarmg985 zen headbutt

[@FraserSouris]

Good video. It's clear you have put a lot of thought and effort into this. However, I am more skeptical of this and feel this kind of battle system would take away from much of Pokemon's appeal and especially hurt the PVP and competitive side. Here are some of the main issues and consequences I forsee: -1- The lack of offensive stats (i.e, those stats being moves instead) while keeping only defensive stats means already defensive mons get better while while fast and frail mons get nerfed hard. Consider Blissy as an example. Yes, Blissy has poor defense. But its HP and Special Defence make it nigh unkillable for Special Attackers. But this was somewhat balanced by the fact that Blissy didn't have much offensive potential (it's best option is literally Seismic Toss). But with this system, it means that even decent moves make Blissy a monster. It's already powerful on the Special Defense side, but now, if it just gets a few decent moves like Thunderbolt or Ice Beam, it can also deal massive damage as well. I expect that a competitive version of this system would turn into people using defensive mons like Blissy, Milotic, Bronzong, Shuckle, Toxapex, Ferrothorn etc since they get to keep their amazing defenses while getting to drop their poor offenses in favour of more powerful moves. Plus, since an aspect of PVP is the idea of switching mons to tank attacks, that becomes less useful if the opponent can hit your switch with the kind of move it is weaker to. Now Conversely, consider Pokemon like Blaziken vs Emboar. They both share the same typing and have very similar learnsets but have very different offensive and defensive stats. Blaziken was always considered better than Emboar because of its higher attack stats and speed being more useful than Emboar's defenses. But with this system, Emboar would automatically become better while Blaziken lacklustre at best since it would no longer have those higher offense stats, while Emboar gets to keep its defenses. I imagine a response would be to just set up the Token System so these defensive mons no longer get as many good moves or fewer buffs to moves. Like if Bronzong learns Confusion, a normally 60 BP move, perhaps it can't be upgraded as much to Psychic or only gets like a 5% boost every level. But I feel this would end up being more uniuitive as one of the cool things about Pokemon is the consistency. You know what Psychic will generally do no matter which Pokemon learns it. The only thing making a move stronger or weaker is the stats which can't really be relied on. Plus, another aspect to consider is that for coverage moves, it doesn't take much BP for a coverage move to be useful. In Gen 3, Flygon ran Gust, a 40BP Flying Type Move because it was a good answer against Heracross. Hidden Power maxes out at 60 BP but was invaluable in prior gens for that coverage and surprise factor. All this means it is very likely for this system to make defensive mons that learn even decent moves OP at the expense of everything else. -2- The lack of specialization in attacking means more Pokemon and battles become interchangeable rather than allow the player to use intuitive game knowledge. By removing Attack and Special Attack and tying it to moves instead, you can't really get to make more Pokemon fall into a niche as then many more Pokemon would be interchangable. For example, as the system currently is, Arcanine is a better physical attacker than Ninetales. While Ninetales is a better special attacker. There is that encouragement of trying to get a Pokemon moves to complement its setup while building around it. But your system would essentially make them both equal since their offensive stats no longer matter and they get the same moves anyway. Pop Quiz: Imagine it is a Generation 3 game, you have an Arcanine vs Alakazam. Your Arcanine knows Flamethrower and Bite. Which move would be the better choice here? It would actually be Flamethrower and not Bite. Since Dark is special in Gen 3 and Alakazam has decent Special Bulk, a Special Bite would be a 60x2 = 120 BP move. While Flamethrower would be 95 x 1.5 (stab) = 145.5 BP Special Move. Adding to this, if your Arcanine had a physical move like Dig or Return or Earthquake, that would be a better option since Arcanine has great physical attack. If this was Gen 4 or later, then even Bite would be the better move now even though it is 60 BP since it is backed by Arcanine's good attack stat. Under your system, we kinda lose all that since you can use whatever move since its only the move that matters. Essentially Pokemon way more into a game of rock paper scissors. Many Pokemon also have a gimmick of being amazing in some offensive stats. Haxourous, Medicham and Rapardos are renowned for their physical attack. They can make Physical moves hit harder than other Pokemon using the same move. Chandalure, Alakazam and Porygon have fantastic special attack so them using the move Shadow Ball will do more damage than say, a Medicham using Shadow Ball. But this system makes it harder for that to come through. I suppose the Token System could still replicate this. Like it could be set up with that all of Chandelure's moves have an extra 30% damage to special attacks or something. But that would need to be coded and tested for all Pokemon individually rather than been intuitive to see. At least with the current system, if you look at Chandelure's base stats and see it has Base 145 Special Attack and immediately know this thing is meant to be a monster with Special Attacks. You don't get that with the Token System which I feel makes it confusing for players. -3- Respeccing and Roles are kinda core parts of Pokemon that are now lost. One of the coolest memories I have of Pokemon is doing a nuzleocke of Platinum. I needed a Special Attacking Infernape for Cynthia since I had lost most of my other mons in the Elite Four. I was able quickly teach my Infernape Calm Mind, Flame Thrower and Grass Knot and use that to help me get the win. Like, Pokemon already lets you train your mon to be different from Wild Mons. TMs, held items and berries allow you to realize a Mon's full potential as well as make them adaptable. A Pokemon that is overly specialized like say, Rampardos, doesn't tend to do well. -4- The increased amount of moves and how much they can be levelled, and priority make competitive even less approachable and even more volatile and unpredictable. WolfeVGC had videos where he talked about the consequences of what happens if a Pokemon learns 5 moves in more detail. Freezai discussed in detail why Terrastilazation got banned because of how it no longer became feasible for a player to make reasonable plays around it. But to quickly summarize, the way Pokemon currently is strikes a nice balance between offense and defensive Mons. A major aspect of competitive Pokemon is how you can get information and act on it. If your opponent has a Charizard Out, you could send out a Rock Type to wall it, but what if that Charizard has a grass move like Solar Beam or Grass Knot? Or a Ground Type Move like Scorching Sands? However, you know that Charizard will most likely have a Fire Type and Flying Type Move for stab, maybe a utility move like Protect or Nasty Plot for the 3rd slot. That leaves only 1 possible coverage move. If you can figure out what the 4th move is, you can know what to safely send in. But with your system, Charizard could have potentially plenty of moves so nothing is safe to switch in. Even if you do "make the right play" and sent in a Flash Fire Heatran on a Fire Blast, that Charizard could then easily KO Heatran with Scorching Sands or Focus Blast or whatever. And whatever you send in next will also get KO-ed because Charizard has the answer for that as well. Again, like I said earlier, it doesn't take much for coverage moves to do their job. In conclusion, I feel this system could work for a spin-off or for a singleplayer only Pokemon game that doesn't care about being competitive. But as a reboot of a main series game, I don't think it could. It removes one of the coolest aspects of Pokemon, that being how its systems can work well in both Singleplayer and Multiplayer, it makes it less intuitive and predictable making multiplayer way more of a guessing game, it risks skewing the balance in favour of defensive mons and makes many mons interchangable. I suppose with enough time and balancing, one could make a fun, balanced and competitive version of this. But current Pokemon has had 20+ years to refine and improve its battle system. The new system doesn't have 20 years of hindsight so I don't think it's very practical. Especially given how much more granular the balancing would have to be.

[@THGMR-ox7sd]

I kinda feel like Pokémon having more than 4 moves can get a bit overwhelming but it’s better than a Pokémon magically forgetting a move to give them a new move.

[@RadioactiveMagicGames]

Too many moves available gives a high risk of Choice Paralysis for sure! Definitely room for improvement on my design, though, with a team and play-testing, hopefully ways to avoid that get implemented.

[@SephonDK]

I think it could work. Decision paralysis is a thing, but if your star points are limited, you'll only get to make some of the moves properly good. It's similar to a lot of other RPGs where the choice of what you're good at is complicated, but when in actual battle you'll mostly do what you're best at, according to your build. I could see it working at least.

[@techstuff9198]

Legends: Arceus Move Pool system is a good in-between.

[@didack1419]

It might not be that much of a problem because the game would be balance from the start, you don't have to worry about the system as it is now. But the game as it is now is balanced around having 4 moves, adding more moves would require heavy rebalancing,

[@15_heidune72]

We could hide the moves you don't care about?

[@commonviewer2488]

Legends gave us readily accessible Move Pools, and it must be a franchise staple from now on.

[@nullpoint3346]

Damn right, though I question how TMs work with it.

[@AlbeyAmakiir]

You know, I tend to think of team building in pokemon like deck-building in CCGs. It's a pretty close parallel, if you ignore the uniqueness of stats each pokemon has. That's probably one reason the current mechanics struggle to get people invested in the individual pokemon. I was also thinking, what if IVs were replaced with a system that doesn't have weak or strong numbers, but varying effects all roughly the same power. Then I realised I'd just re-invented natures. :P I'd like "shinies" to have a distribution. Like, there are a few subtle colour variations that are common, and the more extreme the colour variation the rarer (perhaps a smooth range of colours, rather then hand-picked ones). But nothing *actually* rare. If you want your pokemon to feel unique, like *yours*, it makes sense for them to not all be identical. And I feel like people underestimate the social power a rare cosmetic has, so I'd only go as far as uncommon. Just some thoughts as I was watching.

[@AlexGarcia-ir7fl]

The video has good intention but star for moves is not different from EV spread. This is my opinion from competitive Pokémon player. The 510 evs available for training are optimized by players to have their own set, a good example of this is how unique Arcanine sets are in VGC some of them could be physical defensive, physical attacker, special attacker, support with snarl, even Justified strats. So a star system is not different from what we already have, and we know how resilient to change Pokémon community is, changing the battle system could represent risk for the company just as not adding Pokémons from previous regions was for B&W.

[@dextra_24703]

With priority we already have a system going from -3 to +5, I think

[@marcoasturias8520]

It's more like -7 to +8, with some slots that go unused

[@radio_liminoid]

I am obsessed with this series. Please, please develop a new game system that implements these mechanics. Get hooked up with some game developers. These ideas deserve realization

[@RadioactiveMagicGames]

That is truly lovely to hear, I'm glad you are enjoying them. Who knows? Maybe one day I'll get to make a Pokemon mod :P

[@IchiHishi]

@@RadioactiveMagicGames We need this! ♥

[@SephonDK]

I have thought a bunch about this. A note before I watch. Pokémon's typing system used to be more defined than today. A lot of this was to detriment of balance, like ghost and bug's horrible move pool. But there is a platonic ideal of gen 1 where types really matter. Not every type got a high power move. The physical special system meant that some type combinations resisted in a particular way. Before special steel and fighting moves, physically defensive rock/ground could often tank that reasonably, even when weak to it. Grass had lower base power than water, but had more utility moves. Stuff like that. Types have many more options today, but it also means the types are less defined and more and more becomes reducible to the type chart, even if a lot of identity still remains today; electric doesn't poison, water doesn't inflict status moves, flying is usually a secondary typing more than a typing in itself, and so on. If I were to redo the mechanics, I'd make sure each type was as limited as possible. Magic the Gathering for example does this really well; having clear boundaries of what colors do, and even with later design principles having less weakness/resist-esque than at the game's birth. Black can do a lot, but pays resources for it. Blue has problems permanently removing permanents. Stuff like that.

[@RadioactiveMagicGames]

I really like this! Having types with clearly defined rules and quirks more clearly that we have had in the past. Like Magic the Gathering, Star Realms has each faction with a very clear 'personality' of play styles with only 4 factions. So this idea works very well for smaller diversities... I'm curious how well that would translate to Pokemon which has so many types? Would those quirks get lost among such a large pool of types? This would be something worth exploring and play-testing!

[@SephonDK]

@@RadioactiveMagicGames Thanks for replying

[@RadioactiveMagicGames]

haha yep! Lots of options there! All deserve to be explored, yet, not nearly the opportunity enough to do so. Loving your thoughts on these!

[@aterribleperson9119]

I'm really enjoying this series, and there were some interesting ideas in this video, but I gotta say I don't get what you're going for by removing offensive stats at all. You said that the games can move beyond the limitations of the Gameboy's numbered stats, and your solution was... make it even simpler? Doing this means that aside from level (which is standardised in online battles), there's no offensive difference between Pokemon. Along with the removal of speed, this means that we go from many Pokemon being viable due to many factors, the only things that a good Pokemon really needs are bulk and movepool, which will be less diverse under the new move system combining moves. There is no difference between a level 50 Pichu using 3 star Thunder and a level 50 Zapdos using 3 star Thunder, Pichu just won't take the incoming Fire Blast as well. This means that Pokemon with HP, defence, and special defence are going to be the only ones ever picked unless the less bulky mons have a WAY better moveset.

[@KingAurelius]

ANOTHER AWESOME VIDEO! You're really underrated, mate! The way that you're describing how moves should work really reminds me of some FPS games like Borderlands and Outer Worlds with how their weapon systems works. Upgrading weapons, locking certain weapons until the character level is high enough, the characters stats would be more interactive with the weapon stats, aside from if it's melee combat, so on so forth... I hope you also make the connection. It also made me think of another potential idea: after EVERY trainer battle you can also get TMs with varying ratings that you have to option to teach your pokemon, just like how after defeating enemies in FPS games you have the option to take their weapons. Certain NPC's would have higher rated moves such as Ace Trainers would have 2 stars TM's, and Lass would have 0 star TM's and Gym Leaders would have 3 star TM's. Because of the abundance of NPC's that are not Gym leaders, it would make for a very interesting sort of training method... knowing if you want to skip certain trainers or not taken you know the rewards

[@frivelousknight1321]

hahaha didn't know you play FPS games

[@RadioactiveMagicGames]

That's a really interesting idea! Designing a system of moves being collectible in that fashion reminds me of how card games have you collecting and modifying moves to go into a deck. So much that could be explored here!

[@sebasculin3739]

This is a very well produced video. I have some thoughts of my own about move differences, also partly inspired by Temtem.I have seen the move 'level' idea elsewhere, the major issue, as below would be a few "correct" builds rising to the top. The game has been extremely static for decades. Put the strongest attacks on your Pokemon and hope you EV'd correctly for certain match ups. Even at the highest competitive levels, you won't see more than 7? different moves be used on a PKMN. Most of the complexity is from your EV investment and anticipating the opponents. Hidden figures that players don't understand from playing the game. What can be done to add more tactical and strategic depth? 1. Accuracies keep being changed to make Dark Void useless, stop mons getting para'd all the time or trying to avoid Aaron Zheng missing Will-O-Wisp constantly again. Why not remove accuracy entirely? Competitive play already "avoids" evasion strategies, random misses do not have a place in a competitive PvP game. How then do we balance powerful moves, especially status moves? One system already exists, another would need modifying. 2. Priority, a woefully underutilised mechanic. 99% of moves are priority 0. Again, hidden to casual players. Why not give every move a priority? Existing higher/ lower priorities remain the same and Base 40 and below or weak effects are still priority 0, but now... Base 41-90/ stronger effects: Priority -1 Base 91+ (Heat Wave/ Play Rough etc) and the strongest status moves are Priority -2 This will increase move diversity and increases accessibility (as Gamefreak claim to focus on) as the casual player still running Water Gun will actually outspeed stronger moves and competitive players will need a mix of move strengths to pick up KOs before the opponent. 3. If you're always gonna get out prioritised and KO'd at low health why would you not run slow bulky mons? Because PP, a mechanic that has almost no impact, would be reworked into having a PP meter in game (Temtem system). So powerful moves consume a lot of your Power Points and you will need to recharge. Most moves already have logical values attached to them as in higher PP = smaller fraction. Eg Behemoth Blade would use 8/40 PP points. Running out of PP would trigger a vulnerability eg lower defense so also less stalling PP ups would instead increase a Pokemons max PP A. Hugely less time wasted doing it on every single moves B. Easier to understand than doing it for individual moves. C. No need to rename the item as PP up wouldn't make sense that it reduces PP used. D. Leppa berries can be unbanned from Smogon as it would only reduce recharge turns Conclusion These are competitive, simple changes that are easy to understand without negative game feel. It makes the game easier to balance, if certain moves like base 80 attacks or utility attacks like PuP and Nuzzle become too powerful we can simply increase the amount of PP used and it won't complicate gameplay.

[@FraserSouris]

*>"Why not remove accuracy entirely? Competitive play already "avoids" evasion strategies, random misses do not have a place in a competitive PvP game. "" 2. Priority, a woefully underutilised mechanic. 99% of moves are priority 0. Again, hidden to casual players. Why not give every move a priority? Existing higher/ lower priorities remain the same and Base 40 and below or weak effects are still priority 0, but now... Base 41-90/ stronger effects: Priority -1 Base 91+ (Heat Wave/ Play Rough etc) and the strongest status moves are Priority -2 This will increase move diversity and increases accessibility (as Gamefreak claim to focus on) as the casual player still running Water Gun will actually outspeed stronger moves and competitive players will need a mix of move strengths to pick up KOs before the opponent. "

[@PearFinch]

Here’s an idea… Instead of achievements just based on numerical things like “how many pidgeys did you encounter”, make Pokemon gain tokens from 1. Particularly insightful and hard battles or 2. Specific rival pokemon that you need to discover out in the wild! That’s cool right???

[@PearFinch]

For example, an “achievement battle” may be to have your Magikarp beat a wild Goldeen. Not a bunch of goldeens, just one goldeen. Having “single battle” perk rewards would encourage finding specific pokemon in routes all over again, and you can make some match ups super challenging but rewarding and stake them on a single fight rather than grind out having to fight 25 grass types for a resistance or whatever!

[@PearFinch]

Another cool thingy might be that legendary pokemon, when you catch them, you can distribute all their tokens into whatever you want right when you catch them (unique to legendaries) so it feels awesome filling out all the slots with like 15 tokens to immediatey spend

[@myth2145]

I'm a long-time, obsessed, fan, and an aspiring game dev too. With so much shallow content on KZbin, your channel has been such a find

[@liliflower1376]

Something I think might be interesting is making wild battles and trainer battles different You can send out as many pokemon as you want against that wild caterpie! But against a trainer you've gotta follow the rules! It'd probably different than that but I think making them distinct would break up the game play a bit and make it less repetitive

[@RadioactiveMagicGames]

This makes me think that when fighting a wild Pokemon, you have a very different approach to combat. In a 3d setting, this would be that you want to surround and subdue a wild animal in order to catch it, rather than fight it head on.

[@james-robertc.f.9942]

I'm curious about two elements of the upgraded attacks 1. Branching attack? 2. Struggle First, what about similar moves, like earthquake vs high horsepower. Would you have them start out as different moves, or perhaps a branching path systen, you have "earth tremor" and you can upgrade to either add damage or add area of effect, or even have fissure so those one-hit moves otherwise handicap your usual damage output. I think it'd add more difference between pokémon "builds" Second, struggle - though it's unlikely, if you only invested in one move, you could run out of PP, to ensure that pokémon could still do something, would you still have struggle be an option? If not, is "do nothing" an option, or is it only an option if you're out of PP. If you invested heavily in one move, and then started on another, could you struggle after using your only good move? Could struggle be an infinite PP always selectable move? Could you upgrade struggle as a pretty terrible recoil move, but one with infinite PP?

[@Aurirang]

I'd love an option of 'doing nothing'. If attacking is only detrimental (as example, against an enemy Wobuffet or if you got locked into a move) you should have the option to say 'no'. Not attacking doesn't solve your Problem and ins inherently favorable to your enemy, but it might help you play around some annoying things.

[@Pyronaut_]

Really liked this video. I like the proposed change to battling and leveling as it addresses a major issue I have whenever the discussion of increasing Pokemon's difficulty comes up. People always suggest that trainers should have competitive style Pokemon teams without accounting for the fact that competitive teams necessitate grinding. Some people even propose that higher difficulty levels should disable the exp share, which would literally only serve to increase the amount of grinding. I think it's fine to like grinding, but I don't feel as if it is a meaningful form of difficulty, so I like that you suggested keeping shiny hunting as that's grinding for aesthetic purposes and not grinding to gain power. As to the point of Pokemon not listening to you, I don't think it would make sense for a freshly caught high-level wild Pokemon and a Pokemon you've trained up to the same level to have the same chance to not listen to you. I think something that could make sense would be for how many levels you've had the Pokemon for to factor into the chance of it listening to you. The friendship and affection values could also factor in, if those systems are kept for a reboot.

[@RadioactiveMagicGames]

That's a really good suggestion! Pokemon that are high level and don't know you wouldn't care to listen while ones that you have bonded with will take greater leaps of faith with you. I like it!

[@AlbeyAmakiir]

You could reframe it. Perhaps higher level pokemon that you've trained for a long time could want *you* to trust *their* decisions, because they're "higher level" than you are, so they think they'd know better... even if they don't, actually. But speaking of the player also having levels, why do pokemon care about badges? In a reboot, it could probably be tied to something else.

[@RadioactiveMagicGames]

I'm mean, yeah, a reboot has everything on the chopping block... who says badges would survive?! :P

[@michaelklassen806]

There are some really good ideas here. I really like your take on moves in particular, with each Pokémon able to have more than 4 moves, but then being able to upgrade those moves. I think, under this system, a lot of a Pokémon's identity would then come from its move pool. You would probably want a pretty hard cap on the amount of moves that a Pokémon could get in total, so Mew wouldn't be able to learn every single TM move, for example. This would be made easier by some moves upgrading into others though. I think it also makes TMs much more interesting. Say each Pokémon naturally learns something like eight moves, maybe legendary Pokémon learn one or two more, being able to use a TM to add one or two moves into that pool would feel impactful. Honestly, the move system is something I really like, and could see working really well. It could also make balancing a bit easier, as if a Pokémon is overperforming, you can remove the move that's causing this and replace it with something else. I do think getting rid of offensive stats makes some sense, you could in theory balance Pokémon entirely around giving offensive mons the more powerful moves and defensive mons would get only weaker moves, but it also takes away a possibly core part of a Pokémon's identity. Powerful offensive Pokémon would feel less impressive, because all that power is coming from the moves, not the Pokémon themselves. Having offensive stats would also open up move distribution possibilities a bit, you can afford to give more potent attacks to defensive Pokémon, because they will not hit as hard as when used by offensive mons. One thing to potentially consider is allowing the user to somehow adjust these stats. Maybe if a Pokémon reaches level 100, or max friendship, or some sort of value to represent how well trained they are, the user gets a star to put into a stat, or two stars which can either be added, one to a stat, or use both to increase speed by one (speed is really important). This would allow for a bit more individuality to a Pokémon, while also removing grinding for random good stats. Another potential solution would be to get rid of defensive stats as well as offensive ones, and have that also be taken care of by a Pokémon's move pool. Moves like light screen and reflect would only be able to be learned by defensive and support Pokémon, they could also get moves that give passive bonuses to their defenses, or let them heal their, or allies, HP. I think the intent of keeping defense stats was to keep physical and special split, but this could be achieved with defensive moves, or defensive buffs that only effect a Pokémon's defense or special defense. This would make it so Pokémon basically become just their move pools, which could be very interesting. Either way, I think it feels odd to get rid of one set of stats, while keeping another, but I'm all for simplifying the stats (especially IVs and EVs). I think there would need to be a better system for speed though. Going first in a turn based battle is hugely important, if you move first, not only are you for sure going to at least get move off, but it also opens the door for stuff like causing your opponent to flinch, burning them or otherwise reducing their offensive stats so their move hits for less, putting them to sleep before their move can go off, and so on. So having coin flips for speed ties would make things uncompetitive very fast. A possible solution, have opponents take turns going 'first', so turn one your Pokémon will win any speed ties, than on turn two your opponent will win the speed ties, then turn three it's back to you, and so on. This would allow for speed to still be important, but would make speed ties, which would be happening far more often, to be more predictable, and strategized around. You would probably have some sort of marker to denote who it moving 'first' on a turn, so players could see and then strategize around this. In single player, it could always start with the player, but in PvP there could be other ways to determine which player is the one who gets to 'go first' on the first turn. A couple final thoughts. Trainer token is not a great name, it feels like a physical thing that the player character would carry around and spend however they like, on any Pokémon, calling them something simple like ability points works better, and feels like something linked to the Pokémon, not the trainer. I think, instead of each move having individual PP, each Pokémon could have a PP bar, like a mana bar, which all their moves take from. So, big moves still effectively have less PP, but it adds a bit of strategy to PP management. Also, maybe an unpopular opinion, but, aside from legendary and Pokémon that are hard to breed, I would not mind if you were unable to re-spec Pokémon, as long as it doesn't take too much grinding to get a Pokémon from an egg to a competitive battling level. This could help each Pokémon you raise feel like it has its own identity (but I get that this could also make it a lot harder for people to decide where to spend their ability points). Anyway, I really liked a lot of your ideas, so thought I might share some thoughts.

[@manakete_smoocher]

I think most of the changes that you mentioned would be really cool, but I don’t understand why you didn’t apply the star system to attack power as well? With what you described here, a hypno using psychic would do the same amount of damage as an alakazam using psychic despite how much lower its s.atk currently is in comparison. I like the idea of the stars being based entirely on species, but I don’t see the point in only using that for defense and not attack

[@nintendistultr458]

I wish pokemon had a real time battle system where you actually move your pokemon with the camera locked on the enemy, my main idea with this is that each pokemon would control differently, they would feel different like if each pokemon had a different gameplay and the speed stat would be replaced by real speed, here are some examples: Lucario runs very fast Caterpie moves slowly Slaking doesnt move at all, just tanks everything Flying pokemon have flying controls, each one have different flying speed For aquatic pokemon, the game could give you at some point an item that allows aquatic pokemon to swim in the air

[@marcoasturias8520]

Kindred Fates will be amazing!

[@3lloGuvner]

Personally I really don't like the removal of stats. I would keep base stats of a species so that you can have species that specialise in attack or defence or being fast, however I would get rid of stat growth on level up, the stats of a Pokémon would be the same at level 1 as level 100. The only inherent modifier would be nature. This would also allow you to keep the idea that levelling doesn't make a Pokémon more defensive, only evolution. This also makes it really easy to see how different species stack up against each other at a glance without having to take level differences into account. I would also consider adjusting stats so they all work on a fixed 1-100 scale (except hp), I think that kind of hard limit could help put a cap on power-creep over the long term, not completely sure on that idea yet though. I agree with the idea of trying to balance the game so level difference is less of a factor and moment to moment tactical decision making is the key to victory as much as possible, being able to just over level everything and spam attack your way through is a real problem, especially with how the mainline games shower you in xp by the mid game, if you fight every trainer you can sometimes end up as much as 10 levels over the trainers you're facing in some of the games. I'm not a fan of the stars or spending tokens, to me that runs counter to the idea of organic growth, but I love the idea of power coming from the moves levelling up, I would also probably do this on a 1-100 scale like the Pokémon's level itself, with the moves also evolving into a more powerful version at certain levels, again like the Pokémon themselves. The moves would gain experience as you use them so that you shape the Pokémon's abilities by the ways you use them in battle, leading to the feeling of them being uniquely yours while also giving the player intuitive control over how their Pokémon develops. This could lead to grinding again, but I think that could be avoided if the rate of xp is carefully tested and balanced. To avoid players just levelling every move up to max and destroying that uniqueness I would still have a cap on total move levels, possibly with a system that allows for moves to level back down again if it's used infrequently enough, so that over enough time you can shape the move set exactly how you want it.

[@f1shn0td3d]

I think instead of tokens, we could use Candies, like the candy seen in Pokemon go. It would still serve the same function. Maybe you could also get XL candy, which you could use either as 3 tokens or as a way to manually level up the Pokemon.

[@jaschabull2365]

To be fair regarding Ash's charizard, Ash wasn't its original trainer, similar to the case of a traded pokémon. The way I always saw it was that if you didn't prove yourself to the pokémon to beat it in a fight to catch it, you have to show you know what your doing by showing it that you've won a gym battle instead. That might also explain things like why you can't just throw a ball at a sleeping snorlax to catch it, but after you wake it up, putting it back to sleep, then catching it works, because it knows you were clever enough to strategically put it to sleep yourself and catch it.

[@lolmonkyboi]

goodness this was ana amazing video man, I really hope you continue this series!!

[@RadioactiveMagicGames]

Thank you! The next video is on its way... just some life stuff kept us busy during Feb, hopefully we'll get the next video up in a week or so!

[@goombaluigi8681]

I agree with everything in this but removing stats but I don't think you have to leave the evs in if you keep stats

[@IchiHishi]

About the obedience in pokémon, you needed badges to make your own pokémon listen to you... but only in Gen I. From Gen II onwards, only traded pokémon required the badges.

[@nullpoint3346]

Nature Mints, Bottle Caps, and Vitamins are all great prep items, and should be readily accessible either during or after the "story"

[@RoninCatholic]

My attitude towards Pokemon's various systems that lead to grinding is that any _one_ of them is a good system, but it's combining them _all together_ that doesn't work. IVs and Natures represent basically the same thing (making creatures individuals within their species) but can bump against each other. IVs represent genetic strength and Nature represents personality, but between the two I think Nature both leads to less grinding and works better mechanically due to being zero-sum and most personalities having net neutral impact. EVs and Experience Points/Levels both represent the same thing (training and _experience_ in combat) but do so in different ways. The latter is more conventionally how RPGs function, the former allows more customization and is a better representation of how such things work in real life. Dragon Quest approach (Experience) vs. Final Fantasy 2 approach (Effort Values). I would propose keeping one _or_ the other. When you have both IVs and EVs, there's a lot of incentive to just fish for perfect or near-perfect IVs (to get a specific Hidden Power type or have lower ATK IVs for a special attacker with no physical coverage to reduce Confusion self-harm) and then grind very specific, easy fights to get specific EV spreads. The more of these numbers there are to manipulate, the more the numbers can be used to focus on the stats and break immersion rather than add to it. I like your star system for skill building.

[@mcsmileycorp]

Honestly as a pretty competitive player I live how evs work, sure it's a bit of a grind but it has so much extra depth you can give your pokemon to perform specific tasks, ivs on the other hand could probably be done away with, you can just use hyper training to get a max stat, but max stats aren't optimal for everything making ivs awkward and I wouldn't mind seeing them gone. (Also hidden power should stay dead or work like it does in PLA)

[@RoninCatholic]

@@mcsmileycorp I do think EVs are a good system in a vacuum, but they represent the _same thing_ as Experience Points. So either creatures shouldn't have all-encompassing experience levels but just EVs, or they should just have experience levels and not EVs. And yes, it's grindy either way - one is a lot more user-friendly to casual players (the actual intended audience) and the other is more realistic, more customizable, and certain people enjoy it. Likewise, IVs and Natures are more or less the same thing, and Natures being zero-sum makes them more "fair" than the completely random ranges of IVs as well as actually being visible to casual players who want to learn what they mean. Here it's more "they do the same thing" rather than "they represent the same thing" - IVs are more like total genetic robustness and Natuers are how your personality influences the way you develop and utilize the same talent.

[@Lazy-Lizard]

Im not smart enough to properly outline WHY i dislike the token or "pokemon dont forget moves" ideas, and some others have done a much better job, but this just changes what you're grinding, not removing any grinding. This isn't to say I dislike the rest of your ideas, those are all great and I agree, I just don't really agree with this video's concepts.

[@james-robertc.f.9942]

The leveling up attack system is neat, though a thought: it reminds me of leveling up skills in Fire Emblem, which is similar in having uses/durability per map like the PP system, however it's balanced in that game by having to pay to restore durability and by (usually) having a set number of maps, so grinding is impossible (so, there are exploits, but it's not super convenient or intuitive). If something like that were implemented I think without careful consideration it would just be used for grinding

[@thepizzaman6310]

Funnily enough, the system used in the monster catcher named Monster Sanctuary is very similar to the move system you described. In the game, a higher level monster gets more points, which can be assigned to certain moves. The total amount of moves is low, but with great variation, and being upgradable with these skill tokens. For example, a Blob might have Slime Shot, a magic earth move that can poison, Magic Bolt, a neutral magic attack, and Heal, a move which many have pondered the effects of. I could use a skill point on blob to upgrade Slime Shot to tier two, making it do more damage. There are also passives on the tree, such as aformentioned Slime Shot branching out to a skill that adds an additional chance to poison on ANY attack. There are also aura passives that effect the whole party, such as a multi-poison aura that allows poison to stack. Even unique, high level auras, such as a Blob-exclusive one where the more monsters from the blob family you have in your battling party, the more powerful they all get. Its a good system, so i see it as proof that yours works too. EDIT, now that I have played the game, I can confidently say: This is literally the system used in cassette beasts

[@IcePhoenixMusician]

6:20 I noticed it in a previous video, but calling Rock, Paper, Scissors “scissors, paper, rock” annoys the heck out of me as an American lol.

[@PanTostek]

My own changes are just because of my personal grudge aganist rng: -Remove IVs and natures COMPLETELY. -Make it more obvious how to EVs train effectively, like some dex that tells you what gives you specific EVs. Sure, natures do make each pokemon feel different, but they are just extra RNG and you can spend so much time looking for a nature that straight up doesn't ruin your most important stat. For example, Adamant on Alakazam, Modest on Gyarados and so on.

[@oliverblue]

This is such a great way to approach Pokémon! #AureliusKingdom

[@lythd]

just a quick note for 28:16, thats already how the game works. i didnt know for a while but what ive realised from my last playthrough is that it depends on the level you caught the pokemon on. i can catch a lvl 50 pokemon and it wont listen to me most of the time, but if i catch a lvl 20 pokemon and have it level to lvl 50 it will still listen to me. unless im misunderstanding you i think what u are suggesting is how the system works

[@naejimba]

These are pretty extreme ideas so here are some more radical ways you could change the formula. We've seen scaling systems used in RPGs, and although it has unique challenges it opens up new opportunities. First and foremost, you NEVER have to grind. Second, you can have a truly open world and allow almost all content to be done in any order. The combination of the two can provide completely unique playthroughs, even if you were using the exact same pokemon with the exact same moveset. One interesting effect is this would likely require difficulty settings. Luckily, the bulk of that work could be done by altering the level of enemies in relation to yourself. In fact, if someone was going this far with mechanics, it could be possible to do away with the concept of levels themselves. You simply track the progress of your own pokemon with an experience bar until it caps and they learn something new; whether a new move or they evolve. Such a system also has the benefit of allowing you to rechallenge gyms who would then have either new movesets or even new pokemon base don your level... meaning the replay value of EVERYTHING goes through the roof. This is an idea that would drastically change the series, but it has amazing potential. Romhacks have already ironed out the kinks of this, so it is an actual possibility. Another idea would be to incorporate a basic talent tree system. The main benefits of doing so are increasing replay value and not having to design as many new pokemon each generation. This could simplify the EV mechanic by allowing you to customize stats, while removing 100% of the grind. Instead of gimmicks that you throw away with each gen, you are looking to add new options to the talent trees (ex. you could rework mega evolutions in this system; not a power gain but allows you to change type and moveset). They also could offer the choice between certain powerful moves, which would allow movesets to be more varied while limiting power creep. Furthermore, this could be used to determine natures and abilities, ending the need of catching and breeding the same pokemon over and over. The best part is this is an extra layer of customization that new ideas can be placed on top of, and you can change your talents at any time out of combat to alter your team for a specific fight without changing a member out. My final idea is considering adding CDs to certain abilities. This is an entire new dimension to balance moves and develop strategies around. We could use this to expand the total number of moves you can have at any given time, and even give each move a power budget that means it can only be placed in certain slots. The latter means movesets are more varied and you can offer several powerful options without having to worry about them being stacked. You could also take the idea from the South Park game Stick of Truth where there were "hero abilities" that had a CD and you were forced to choose between using one of those or an item in a turn. There are a lot of interesting possibilities.

[@diurtydantv8061]

"Not that I'm suggesting a change to the turn based mechanic" I am. Pokemon would make the perfect souls like.

[@vanderan]

Very drastic of a change! I'm not entirely sure it would fit my fancy, but I definitely don't see any obvious flaws either.

[@FraserSouris]

I see a quite a few flaws. -1- The lack of offensive stats (i.e, those stats being moves instead) while keeping only defensive stats means already defensive mons get better while while fast and frail mons get nerfed hard. Consider Blissy as an example. Yes, Blissy has poor defense. But its HP and Special Defence make it nigh unkillable for Special Attackers. But this was somewhat balanced by the fact that Blissy didn't have much offensive potential (it's best option is literally Seismic Toss). But with this system, it means that even decent moves make Blissy a monster. It's already powerful on the Special Defense side, but now, if it just gets a few decent moves like Thunderbolt or Ice Beam, it can also deal massive damage as well. I expect that a competitive version of this system would turn into people using defensive mons like Blissy, Milotic, Bronzong, Shuckle, Toxapex, Ferrothorn etc since they get to keep their amazing defenses while getting to drop their poor offenses in favour of more powerful moves. Plus, since an aspect of PVP is the idea of switching mons to tank attacks, that becomes less useful if the opponent can hit your switch with the kind of move it is weaker to. Now Conversely, consider Pokemon like Blaziken vs Emboar. They both share the same typing and have very similar learnsets but have very different offensive and defensive stats. Blaziken was always considered better than Emboar because of its higher attack stats and speed being more useful than Emboar's defenses. But with this system, Emboar would automatically become better while Blaziken lacklustre at best since it would no longer have those higher offense stats, while Emboar gets to keep its defenses. I imagine a response would be to just set up the Token System so these defensive mons no longer get as many good moves or fewer buffs to moves. Like if Bronzong learns Confusion, a normally 60 BP move, perhaps it can't be upgraded as much to Psychic or only gets like a 5% boost every level. But I feel this would end up being more uniuitive as one of the cool things about Pokemon is the consistency. You know what Psychic will generally do no matter which Pokemon learns it. The only thing making a move stronger or weaker is the stats which can't really be relied on. Plus, another aspect to consider is that for coverage moves, it doesn't take much BP for a coverage move to be useful. In Gen 3, Flygon ran Gust, a 40BP Flying Type Move because it was a good answer against Heracross. Hidden Power maxes out at 60 BP but was invaluable in prior gens for that coverage and surprise factor. All this means it is very likely for this system to make defensive mons that learn even decent moves OP at the expense of everything else. -2- The lack of specialization in attacking means more Pokemon and battles become interchangeable rather than allow the player to use intuitive game knowledge. By removing Attack and Special Attack and tying it to moves instead, you can't really get to make more Pokemon fall into a niche as then many more Pokemon would be interchangable. For example, as the system currently is, Arcanine is a better physical attacker than Ninetales. While Ninetales is a better special attacker. There is that encouragement of trying to get a Pokemon moves to complement its setup while building around it. But your system would essentially make them both equal since their offensive stats no longer matter and they get the same moves anyway. -3- Respeccing and Roles are kinda core parts of Pokemon that are now lost. One of the coolest memories I have of Pokemon is doing a nuzleocke of Platinum. I needed a Special Attacking Infernape for Cynthia since I had lost most of my other mons in the Elite Four. I was able quickly teach my Infernape Calm Mind, Flame Thrower and Grass Knot and use that to help me get the win. Like, Pokemon already lets you train your mon to be different from Wild Mons. TMs, held items and berries allow you to realize a Mon's full potential as well as make them adaptable. A Pokemon that is overly specialized like say, Rampardos, doesn't tend to do well. -4- The increased amount of moves and how much they can be levelled, and priority make competitive even less approachable and even more volatile and unpredictable. WolfeVGC had videos where he talked about the consequences of what happens if a Pokemon learns 5 moves in more detail. Freezai discussed in detail why Terrastilazation got banned because of how it no longer became feasible for a player to make reasonable plays around it. But to quickly summarize, the way Pokemon currently is strikes a nice balance between offense and defensive Mons. A major aspect of competitive Pokemon is how you can get information and act on it. If your opponent has a Charizard Out, you could send out a Rock Type to wall it, but what if that Charizard has a grass move like Solar Beam or Grass Knot? Or a Ground Type Move like Scorching Sands? However, you know that Charizard will most likely have a Fire Type and Flying Type Move for stab, maybe a utility move like Protect or Nasty Plot for the 3rd slot. That leaves only 1 possible coverage move. If you can figure out what the 4th move is, you can know what to safely send in. But with your system, Charizard could have potentially plenty of moves so nothing is safe to switch in. Even if you do "make the right play" and sent in a Flash Fire Heatran on a Fire Blast, that Charizard could then easily KO Heatran with Scorching Sands or Focus Blast or whatever. And whatever you send in next will also get KO-ed because Charizard has the answer for that as well. Again, like I said earlier, it doesn't take much for coverage moves to do their job. In conclusion, I feel this system could work for a spin-off or for a singleplayer only Pokemon game that doesn't care about being competitive. But as a reboot of a main series game, I don't think it could. It removes one of the coolest aspects of Pokemon, that being how its systems can work well in both Singleplayer and Multiplayer, it makes it less intuitive and predictable making multiplayer way more of a guessing game, it risks skewing the balance in favour of defensive mons and makes many mons interchangable. I suppose with enough time and balancing, one could make a fun, balanced and competitive version of this. But current Pokemon has had 20+ years to refine and improve its battle system. The new system doesn't have 20 years of hindsight so I don't think it's very practical. Especially given how much more granular the balancing would have to be.

[@enderluckjarmg985]

​@@FraserSouris You rlly should comment this on the actual video if havent thats some real good criticism

[@farresalt4381]

Spamming your notifications, heh. Anyway... Your production quality is astonishing. Good work! Not a praise, but an appraisal. As in - factual, not condescending. Also thought about the idea of having more than four moves. Although my implementation is different from yours, I'm leaning more toward the idea of keeping the grind and just making it more enjoyable.

[@j_herm4415]

Who are you only pulling in a couple hundred views? You have the quality of a couple K channel easy

[@RFDN0]

The only thing the 3 star system does decently well for pokemon in general is equalize moves sets... which can be seen as a flaw as you are removing choices. The side quests for tokens is still grinding there are no if ands or buts about it the same way or worse than the current EV system. Bottle caps already fix most of the IV issue all we need is something to be able to set IVs to 0 for those edge cases. Resetting EVs is already something that was in SWSH and is now implemented in SV. A major flaw of losing the stats is that you significantly limit the differating factors of each pokemon species. This is not future proof and would cap out very quickly. There is a reason that most games using star systems like yours only use them for moves and specifically use them as mastery of moves and occasionally active abilities. They also normally do full resets of the cast in a future enstallment which goes against the core idea of a moster collection game. I get what you were trying to do but this system just does not work for what pokemon is trying to do.

[@bradpollard444]

Imagine taking everything that was suggested in this video but adding that Pokemon now battle like in Stadium.

[@treisir.9649]

I love this Reboot Series. Started with Ep.8, but got back for all previous and subsequent episodes. Great Videos, great work. Love it!🎉

[@RainShadow-yi3xr]

this is a neat idea, but I think it would be too hard to balance around and make it hard for Pokemon to stand out when move pools are the only thing differentiating them. The existing stat system already allows for plenty of customisation it just needs to be made more transparent and easier to understand. Replacing EVs, IVs, and natures with a system to let you add points to stats working similarly to your 3 star system, where you could spend a resource to add a 'star' to your attack stat for example, would seem to offer the same improvements to player expressino and usablility without introducing a bunch of new problems with balancing and the identity of each Pokemon relative to others of the same type.

[@mertensiam3384]

Having more than 4 moves sounds like an extremely bad idea. Most Pokemon having only 4 moves is what balances them out. A very powerful Pokemon with a shit ton of coverage would be extremely difficult to deal with. I like the idea of the moves having stars or whatever sounds good but the idea of having more than 4 is bad

[@Sweaty_On_YT]

Great video #AureliusKingdom

[@15_heidune72]

What if friendship lets pokemon listen to you more? As in, if the pokemon really likes you, it would still listen to you even if their level is a bit too high with limits, of course.

[@itsmefuyt]

sick editing bro! #AureliusKingdom

[@Tomakeit]

Hello there, I like your content and want to bring my little sand grain.. Im actually making a version of Pokemon pen and paper based on dnd combat mechanics, to do that I had to convert all damages to dice easy numbers and stat to equivalent in 5e terms, well its not the place to go in details but as I wanted to include a more reallistic battle sensation I a mixed stats to be like Defence CA and Special Defence CA and to do that I included Speed in the defense system to make the "dodge" effect more realistic, like an Onix can handle Attacks a Jolteon can dodge both Attacks and Special ones. Its true that I had some problems to balance this as Im doing it by my own but its kind fun and in the end is just another mechanic to make things funnier. Would be nice to see how this work with a more detailed looking or with some testing.

[@liliflower1376]

God I hope someone makes this fangame

[@finnvaneekelen4966]

I overall like these ideas but im not sure if i whould enjoy having this suddenly be how pokemon was from now on, it whould be a really cool fangame though

[@IcePhoenixMusician]

4:53 additionally, it requires knowledge that such a manipulation technique exists… and that isn’t abundantly clear to most people who aren’t knee deep in Pokémon already

[@vidux6289]

Dude ! Great video, if I had money, I'd hire you on the spot 😍

[@RadioactiveMagicGames]

Aw, thank you! ^_^

[@XeroShifter]

I really enjoyed watching this video but I think that some of the ideas here would need a bit more work/refining even in just the conceptual state they're in. 3 stars per stat kept is not enough granularity to give 1000+ pokemon a niche to occupy even if you have abilites and a more complex move system. When you have more granularity you introduce opportunities for depth and emergent player behavior. Does this mean I want to keep the current set up of 6 stats, Ivs, Evs, etc, absolutely not. I'm not sure exactly where the point of meaningful granularity is hit, but 3 stats with 3 levels each would mean that in theory a pokemon could only have 27 different stat combinations, and that's assuming you decide to make speed its own stat and not solely rely on priority as you initially explore. I do really like the idea of reducing stat complexity though, its a huge barrier to competition, and even the pokemon company has been taking steps to make IVs irrelevant and EVs easier to obtain. I think that maybe the ideal middle ground between simplicity, convenience, and depth would be something like Monster Sanctuary's food system. Imagine that a pokemon has base stats that range from 1-5 stars for the three suggested stats, and then you can feed your pokemon, At any time you can see the last three food you fed your pokemon, and each piece of food you feed it gives it a statistical benefit of some kind, but only the last three food are applied/tracked. The food would provide bonuses like "+10hp" or "+20 damage with fire moves" etc, and the possibilities of what could be introduced would be virtually endless. Since its food each region could bring back any that were well liked (or create a re-flavored statistical copy of it), as well as ditch any that weren't right for the game, region, or series. By using this food system you gain back some of the depth of targeting EVs at out-doing certain opponents from competitive, add a bite of uncertainty and build scouting back to competitive play, but make it easy to engage with, or re-visit as you explore the game more. Plus its cute and further embraces the idea that the pokemon are your friends and that you're bonding with them. Actually the "unlimited" nature of move selection you propose would also help to destroy many niches as well. There are, and would likely be many moves with binary outcomes, such as "removed entry hazard" or "removed status effects". The binary nature of these effects means that if you have unlimited move selection, those moves will never need full or possibly any investment, and merely having it on your pokemon would be enough. Suddenly you risk that whatever pokemon has the strongest fulfillment of another needed role, and also brings the binary effect outclasses all those with either less ideal stats or abilities while still posessing the move, but also in cases where the binary effect is important, its possesers would make those of similar roles without the effect completely irrelevant. You may be able to turn some of those moves into non-binary outcomes with work, but not every effect can. Having a restricted number of moves in a battle it actually really important because it means that designers can safely give pokemon a wide variety of moves to allow for a pokemon to flex into during a play-through, and it also means that in versus battles, or more challenging fights, a single pokemon would have a comparatively difficult time trying to one-man-army things. TemTem actually solved the move selection issue pretty elegantly (not something I say about TemTem particularly often,) by having a monster only able to bring a limited move pool into the battle, but able to change that move pool around as much as you like outside of battle. The number 4 isn't necessarily right so were it my project to reboot the games I would want to create a model to test with 4, 6, and maybe even 8 with some restrictions (like 4 same-type move slots, 2 non-attack slots, and 2 free slots or something) just to see what fulfills the goals best. I do love the idea of "leveling up" your moves though. It quite nicely removes the need for "strictly worse" moves, helps to create progression, and with the right surrounding design can help to accomplish the goal of giving the pokemon an individual identity during a single player's journey. I am a little disappointed you didn't address PP more in the video. While PP has been with the franchise since the beginning, I'm not sure that its a great solution going forward when so many other things in battles are changing. Monster tamer games have made passes at PP before with things like stamina systems, and many of them miss the mark. If I were rebooting the franchise I would definitely want to revisit what makes PP successful, and where it can be touched up. Since you didn't, I guess I'll share my thoughts/understanding in brief here, before I do though, I just want to say that I am really enjoying the series you're making, and that I do think this is a great video overall. So PP originally performed two functions, limiting how many times you could use more powerful attacks in a battle, and making longer periods between pokemon center trips feel more exhausting and difficult to get through. But in many ways both of these things have either been dialed back, or nearly eliminated over time. The presence of the PPUP item and ability to use it on every pokemon, on every move multiple times makes the limitation on the most powerful moves of only having 5pp, essentially a non-issue in single-battle sessions. Once you progress far enough in any game to get a few PPUPs, the limitation stops applying. PPUPs also intrude on long route design but significantly less so. PP also ceases to matter almost completely in a design with unlimited move selection. I believe that part of the fun derived from PP's design space is had when resources feel limited, and you are making a choice about if you should save the powerful move uses for later or not. You can see a similar kind of fun added to the game each generation with the gimick battle mechanics, such as Mega evolution, Z-moves, Dynamax, and Terrastilization, but the mechanic is taken in the opposite direction. Instead of putting the player in the head space of a draining resource, they put players in the head space of having a secret trump card or ace up their sleeve. One potential replacement for PP would be to give the player "Battle Orders" (or a rose by any other name,) where a very limited number of times per battle they could issue one of only a handful of special orders in addition to the pokemon move. Potential options that could be considered for the mechanic would be stuff like "survive this hit" or, "don't miss" or, "dodge it" or, "hit 'em hard" or even "shrug off the status". Right now many of these effects are tied to the affection system, and cannot be relied upon by the player to happen, used at all in competitive, and cannot be balanced for by the designers because they're just too inconsistent. The orders could also have downsides if they needed them for balance reasons. If unlocked partially through the game, or after leveling a pokemon up a few times while under your care, the mechanic could be consistent enough to be counted on, while acting as another way for pokemon to feel bonded to the player. This is essentially just trainer PP, but its important that it feels good to use, isn't tied to every move individually, doesn't have your fire type running out of fire power, and doesn't force constant returns to healing/resting. As for longer routes, pokemon has been using mechanics like camping recently to retire this kind of challenge from the games, but if it were to make a return, much like pp, bo could only recharge at specific intervals or events such as resting, while still being limited per battle, and it would only force these activities for very challenging fights since at least the pokemon can still attack.

[@christopherperez1252]

I'd like to see a proof of concept for this even if it's a simple internet browser test. Some points to be made, the Base Stat System shouldn't be changed, and instead you should get normal progression with perhaps stat tokens or such every level or every other level which you can use to raise stats. Or perhaps a system of quests which if your pokemon accomplishes something it gets a buff to a stat or such. The 6 stat system allows pokemon to be very easily balances against one another, despite the fact game freak isn't a fan of doing so.

[@shadowmarauder6033]

Although. I like this idea for an RPG battling system, it feels too disconnected from the franchise and that there’s s risk for tanks or attackers to get better, depending on how strong those systems would work. I do like the idea of the move upgrade system, aa that aspect has been used in the spinoff games multiple times like SMD and Conquest.

[@nobodyimportant4778]

I'm a little baffled you kept accuracy. Also the achievements brings grinding back

[@drowzypollinator640]

Wonderful and interesting video! I think the removal of the strength stats makes for more homogeneous offense, assuming that each Pokémon doesn't have individual moves (I think move reuse is good for both software and human memory). I like the idea of stars/tokens being allocated, but their accrual sounded a little too similar to the grinding in the original games. Personally, I think more often than not, I would like to see your ability as a trainer increased than having to grind each Pokémon individually. That makes it so that, throughout the game, you can only train Pokémon up to a certain point based on milestones you've achieved, but post game, you don't have to grind to get the team you want. Honestly, even levels feel nearly obsolete, but gaining one for each milestone you reach seems reasonable. I like the allocation of tokens, but instead of a Pokémon accruing them, I feel like it's a trainer accruing tokens as they reach milestones (gyms, evil teams, route bosses, rival battles, totems, etc). I'd be fine with an individual Pokémon needing to accrue "experience" in order to receive these tokens as long as it is streamlined from what we have now.

[@jeffreyseamons5514]

I highly doubt ill ever get to do it, but if I do make my own creature collector game can i use some or all of this? Its really good.

[@tobeavus]

I was always of the idea that pokemon should have 4 moves and one "basic attack". The 4 moves act and can be swapped as they do currently but the basic attack is set per pokemon to be either a special or physical attack that has infinite pp

[@PJutch]

I like small quests for pokemons, upgrading moves and disobeing. I'm not sure about removing stats, it seems kinda pointless and weird. And tokens don't feel like a pokemon thing. Can't we just change how EV work a little bit? Just make ways to get'em make sense. For example, to raise physical defence instead of fighting specific pokemon you'll need to just take physical damage. Hp is upgraded proportional to hp lost (after applying defence. Same with special defence. Moves will be upgraded by using them. Attack/special attack will be upgraded by using moves (if this stats will be there). Speed is weird because it is'nt clear should it be upgraded by going first or second. Maybe it is worth removing, idk.

[@aaron9797]

i was thinking about adding a mana system so you can remove the pp of a move and have it use mana instead

[@IcePhoenixMusician]

I think that you’re offering a bit too many moves currently, however I like your train of thought. Maybe you have a certain window in order to invest points to get a certain move to avoid unlearned move bloat. Like maybe peck can only be learned levels 1-15 or something?

[@CAceInPoint]

The proposed system wouldn’t be bloated with weak moves because they would just become stronger moves. Peck could turn into Drill Peck (or anything that fits) at higher stars.

[@IcePhoenixMusician]

@@CAceInPoint I meant moves you specifically put no points into… they theoretically in the proposed system just exist statically until you put a point in and then can actually be used

[@geelongrep3302]

Good job mate

[@sardav2011]

Epic vid, had no idea about this🔥🔥👍#AureliusKingdom

[@Onzaru]

Not bad at all. Could see this working with a few tweaks but it's a solid foundation. I know spin offs like mystery dungeon already have something similar with the move power increasing with use, could be like when thundershock reaches lvl 3 u get access to thundrbolt lvl1 etc. Digimon cyber sleuth has a system where u can equip some of your moves for use and i guess S/V now too since u can relearn at will so we could go with that andset the limit to 6 active moves but rather than move pp i think having a pp bar might be better for balance so everyone doesnt just equip broken ass moves and spam without cost, can have pp recover in small amounts each turn and switching replenish it by 50%. The passive buffs and debuffs can play into that too. So a Thunder lvl 3 would hit everyone on the enemy side, moderate chance to paralyze but at best be usable 2-4 times but the enemy may have a buff to spdef or a passive that drains pp like pressure so thunder does less or could only be used like twice at best.

[@IMadeThatJumpCmon]

Unfortunately, with all of the star quests and the way that offensive moves have been simplified, I think this system weakens offensive pokemon and only strengthens defensive ones, and the quests only INCREASE grinding, not decrease it at all, because now we have to do the equivalent of completely filling out a Legends Arceus pokedex page in order to get a perfect mon, and that is WAY more work. I was with you on the world building and story aspects of your ideas, but I think game mechanics are something you just have to playtest in order to understand if they work. I think you'd find that attempting to get a competitively viable Garchomp in the current breeding and IV/EV system would take much less time an effort than in your stars and credits system, and I think that it'd be worse for it.

[@umwha]

I admire your boldness

[@TheWandererOfDreams]

You should make a creature collector yourself. (Please, IT'D BE FUNNNNNN-)

[@ProfessorWaifu]

Does he not know the first Gen games (I mean like Red, not fire red) were like that? No pokemon listened to you if you didn't have the badges.

[@AtlasNovack]

I still think IVs were a dumb mechanic.

[@Kenseiblades]

A lot of this sounds like Monster Rancher to me.

[@weatherman1504]

As someone currently playing one of the older games, this feels both needlessly complex and needlessly simple all at the same time somehow. I dunno, I don likit

[@Nkanyiso_K]

9:50 three star system 🤔

[@ChrisCrucial]

#AureliusKingdom

[@chunk1179]

❤

[@frivelousknight1321]

Was 69th subscriber 🤣 great video too you're going to blow up! #AureliusKingdom

[@zaperator4449]

Imma pass on allat 😭

[@NeoWocky]

While interesting this basically boils down to different ways to min-max the fun out of pokemon. Many of the suggestions are even tailored for it as the pokemon with the higher number of "tokens" is the optimal choice, and depending on the method of obtaining them, whatever pokemon which has the most of them is automatically better, specially because there's almost nothing else to balance out said min-maxing

[@shinoshiny]

Feels like im listening to a school lecture, drifting aloof and not getting half of it

[@isjdhdfjkasdas]

I usually really like your suggestions for Pokemon but this sounds awful

[@gastfaremis1136]

wow nice try lol

[@gastfaremis1136]

maybe not that nice but the best until now

[@mortlemur5291]

Great video #AureliusKingdom