Adjustment of Pokémon

[Spherical Ice]

How do you feel when ROM hacks edit existing Pokémon? Do you prefer them to be up to date with the current generation, left as they were in the generation the ROM hack is of, or are you okay with hackers giving certain Pokémon custom move sets, base stats, abilities, new typings, and so on? If so, to what extent?

 

[Blah]

I don't mind people editing stuff. I think that as a designer of your own game, if you conclude that adjusting certain Pokemon will yield better game play, then you should make the adjustments. There shouldn't be an obligation there to keep it original.

Making changes left and right to the point where Pikachu evolves into a fire breathing dragon might not be so good :P

 

[Deokishisu]

This is a really interesting topic that might actually yield some fruitful debate.

On the one hand, I'm a firm believer that GameFreak cares very little about balance outside of some stereotypical powerhouses and the new Pokemon they're bringing in. They never do anything substantial with older Pokemon if they're not throwing them a Mega, and that's mostly to prevent breaking backwards compatibility. To that end, I can't fault a hacker for wanting to make changes to a Pokemon's movesets, valid abilities, or base stats. That is, as long as the changes are not absolutely absurd or completely unbalanced. For a great example of rebalancing done right, check out Yet Another Firered Hack by DoesntKnowHowToPlay. It's stock Firered plot with balancing that is near perfect, and a great example to learn from.

However, I myself am very hesitant to change those things in my own hack. I'll often pull from existing movepools from all of the generations when deciding if a Pokemon needs an adjustment, not giving them a move if they've never ever had access to it. But if that Pokemon had an obscure, one-time event back in Gen 1 that granted it a move, I'd certainly consider handing it out if it's needed. As a rule, I never touch base stats. I'm a bit split on abilities. On the one hand, we don't have perfect implementation of all of the current abilities yet. On the other, many Pokemon are functionally completely different Pokemon without some of their current abilities. Fortunately, I'm not really in a position that I'll have to consider that yet for many Pokemon, and when I do it'll be negligible. Most of my hangups with changing things like this come from a lack of confidence in balancing things on my own, and a general desire to maintain trade compatibility with the stock Gen 3 games for my hack. I figure that official GameFreak imbalance is better than imbalance that I myself am forcing on my future players.

 

[Mana1]

All changes are good as long as they're fitting for the pokemon species and where you get them in the ROM hack. Some might be weakened to fit early gameplay, or strengthened to be more on par with 'Starter' species, etc. I dislike it when every pokemon of x-type ends up with the same moves - or with nonsensical moves ):. Just... apply some logic, then it'll be fine!

 

[loser]

I was working on some dumb hack a while ago, and I changed a lot about "forgettable" pokemon, like bugs, or those one-offs from johto or hoenn, stuff like that. I completely revamped them, giving them custom moves, abilities, stats, and even types! But then I realized they were nothing like the original pokemon! The sprite and name were it, it felt like a whole new pokemon. If you are okay with that is really what makes it "good" or "bad"

 

[giradialkia]

Generally I like when Pokémon are modernised to their most recent movesets/stat sets. Even if that's only because I'd forget the generation in which certain changes were made, get excited about a Pokémon, then be disappointed when it's using its Gen 3 stats.

In general since the introduction of the Fairy type (and all the changes to the battle mechanics that coincided with the Fairy type, ie. Steel's resistance changes to Dark/Ghost), as well as the Physical/Special split from 4th gen, it's hard to go back to a 3rd gen engine, using 3rd gen moves, and enjoy the battles.

TL;DR it's super awesome that there are patches out there that do all of this stuff, and unless people are going for a retro experience (which would be a bit of a cop-out when it comes to the battle mechanics), I think it's good when people modernise Pokémon's stats and moves.

On the other hand, people giving Pokémon custom movesets is a little dodgy. Unless they're logical and reasonable, they're obviously going to favour certain Pokémon over others, resulting in a generally broken system of already-OP Pokémon being unstoppable, and lesser-Pokémon being entirely useless.

 

[Xencleamas]

To judge about it, I don't matter that... but there are people too who want to change stuff for improvements. It is okay for me I guess if the improvements found things logical and scientific. However, if it turns out like unnatural or super OP, that's when things I don't like most (only in the Pokemon logic by the way) (such as Dark Rising's Conarp, that's one for the OP thing).

I do slightly care changing stuff. One is type changing...like having Luxray into Electric and Dark type... and Grovyle and Sceptile having Grass and Dragon type. For Luxray, I just wanna have it a dark/murky creature (not something like a badass character) since I have thought of Luxray being active at night. For Grovyle and Sceptile, I've been wondering why are they in part of Dragon egg group. Is it they are lizard or dragon based too? Well I get the point why Sceptile learns Dragon Claw and having its Mega being a Dragon. If this happens for real, these might be too OP for its other partners (Torchic line having normal effectiveness to such Grass type Treecko line)... or not (Mudkip line such super Ice Beam).

For the Pokemon I don't really use because of capabilities or "forgettable", well I do care them too since they are part of the Pokemon nature (I can't just have Salamence all day, I need caring Dunsparce). So that is why I quitted replacing and moved on to expanding stuff.

I have been enjoying too with the Fairy type. Even if it is even kills dragons, that type should exist in nature. Hmm... shouldn't be fairies are weak to dark too because most of the fairy tales I have read that the antagonists are using dark magic and stuff to weaken the princess/prince and the hero/heroine as well. Maybe the fairy type after all is a light element while dark is still dark. I think fairy and dark should be weak to each other.

The most thing I wanna see in hacks is the engine updated to the latest generation's engine (such as the physical/special/status split, new stuff, and updated stuff such as the repel thingy).

 

[Avara]

Not really adding much new to what's been said already. I think it's okay when used in CERTAIN situations - balancing stats between starters to make it fairer for example. I quite like to see the odd typing change now and again too as long as it seems believable, Luxray Dark/Electric being a good example. I am however against it if people just do stuff like give a Sentret Dragon Rage or maxing out all the stats of one Pokemon to make it OP.

 

[Patsfan22]

Yeah, like most people said, I wouldn't want Pokémon to be made overpowering for no reason. Certain Pokémon should be stronger than others, but it has to make sense. You wouldn't want a Charizard getting wrecked by a Wigglytuff, on my opinion. If you think you can rebalance Pokémon relative to the world, I say go for it. Adding moves or types or changing stats is all fine. Just don't be lazy lol.

For updating Pokémon to be like Gen 6 or whatever, I could care less. It really depends on what you want to do.

 

[AtomicTofu]

I like it when the Pokemon from an existing generation are tweaked a little bit so that they aren't the same as they are in the actual games.

 

[Zehn]

I don't mind it, as long it doesn't make it OP