[Discussion] The few, the proud... or not?

Hi, I honestly didn't know how to title this but here's a more "technical" discussion about challenges! Especially some of the ones I've been trying to create lately, or for the purpose of events~

Some background: I've played a lot of Pokémon Reborn and similar. I've noticed just how much those games force you to change and adapt your team as you go, both by limiting access to more versatile critters and by giving you very hard battles that require a lot of planning. I actually loved that aspect of the game because it made me appreciate so many Pokémon I would've never used, and made me genuinely want to hug things like Vespiquen and Jumpluff.

That's why I kinda made it my mission to find rules and challenges that would allow for more Pokémon variety, even in a single run of the game. Perhaps nothing can replicate Reborn in that sense, but I feel like I got close enough to it with the current Lampent Challenge. Even some simple limitation that make you swap your team members often and always look for new Pokémon to catch, even those that are usually too late in the game, to me... they can really make games more fun and interesting. I asked around for opinions after my 2020 event and I found comments such as "I would've never used this Pokémon without this challenge" which makes me know I hit bullseye!

It's also true that you can achieve something similar without swapping your team over and over - something that I can totally get can become frustrating. There's things like Monotypes for that, there's the "Ones that got away" challenge, there's tons of other limitations you can place on yourself and keep up for an entire run. I've tried a Flying monotype in Platinum a long time ago and that also let me appreciate Pokémon I'd have never used, such as Gliscor and Yanmega.

So, to summarize, we have two kinds of challenge rules. One pushes for more team rotations and forces you to adapt your playstyle as you go, while the other forces you to only use certain Pokémon for a whole run and make it work no matter what. What's your favorite of the two? Why? Any good memories of playing with either "challenge style"?

I do try to use Pokemon I haven't used before - or at the very least the opposite, and avoid Pokémon I've used before - but I guess I mostly do challenges where you can change your team, but you really wouldn't because grinding is a bit of a pain?

Like Monotypes and so forth. I never liked Nuzlockes, but I do kinda dig the Lampent rules - I think I mostly did a similar challenge during the last forum event and it's being an interesting enough experience doing it on LGP here.

It's not something I'd do all the time, but it's definitely something to add to the rotation.

I love challenges where I can change my team. I don't particularly like Nuzlockes, because I tend to rely on some of the most commonly found pokemon. I've devised a system similar to the Lampent challenge -- after major battles (gyms, rivals, bosses, etc.) I roll a d8 to see which pokemon I'll be trading out and then switch it for the first pokemon in the box whose type doesn't match any of the others in the team. I've tried systems that limit what team members you use and I've found it can get boring. So for me it's worth any extra grinding to switch things around frequently.

I like challenges that push players to reevaluate their strategies, use more Pokémon and sometimes even try Pokémon you might have otherwise ignored. However, that's as long as the game I'm playing has enough QoL and provides the tools to build/improve/change my team at a reasonable pace.

So, game is so challenging it expects me to train more than the usual six Pokémon? Nice, but many players don't like spending a lot of time grinding, EV training/breeding, etc. for every Pokémon that's required to win one specific battle.

I also don't like gimmick difficulties, like purposely messing with the movesets so that the player won't get access to certain moves (while the AI does), or give bosses illegal advantages such as: "Fire type gym but leader gets permanent sunlight + Magnet Rise + there's a mystic energy that ensures all Rock type moves miss...". There is genuine challenge and there's trolling the player with bullmuk that just can't happen legitimately.