Article: Hyper Training blows the metagame wide open

Find out how Pokémon Sun and Moon's Hyper Training smashes the doors to the competitive metagame — and why it's a good thing.

Click here to read the article.

It's a little early to say that Hyper Training "blows the metagame wide open". How much of an impact this'll have is largely dependent on 3 things:

1) How easy will it be to get a Pokemon to level 100 in Sun/Moon?
2) How easily obtainable are Bottle Caps?
3) Are there any limitations to how much you can increase a Pokemon's IVs?

If it turns out that getting to level 100 is not easy, or that Bottle Caps are difficult to get in large numbers, or that you can only increase so many stats or by only so much, it's not likely to change much. If it is easy to get to level 100, and Bottle Caps are easy to get lots of, and there's no real limits (other than the 31 as the maximum for a stat's IV) to the increasing we can do, it could make a serious impact, but....

People already breed for good IVs for their teams. In Gen 6 it is, while still tedious, not borderline impossible to do anymore. If you're serious about battling you likely will go through the trouble of breeding for those IVs, and enough people do that that teams with great IV spreads are kind of the norm in Battle Spot. So it could potentially make getting Pokemon with good IVs more accessible/faster, but won't really change the landscape of competitive battling. It's already filled with good IV teams.

What this'll be really good for though is stuff like legendaries and special event 'mons, who are still somewhat difficult to get with all the optimal stuff (praise be cloning for allowing for some decent level of distribution of high IV legendaries), and patching up IV spreads. Idk how many times I'll be breeding something and want like 31/x/31/31/31/31 but instead get like 31/31/31/x/31/31 and have to breed how many more batches to get the one I want. Could instead with Hyper Training just take that first one and fill in the Sp.Attack IV....which then also gives me a 6 IV Pokemon!

ramblerambleramble

I agree with the above. I think the article is a bit too full of praise for the system, honestly. I still hate that they're making IVs (genes) changeable, which makes zero sense.

I think people are getting too caught up in what this will do and are forgetting to ask what the best way to do it is.

The fact that they are already talking about how the first Mythical you get will be holding a bottle cap makes me think that there will be an INCREDIBLY small number. Which is the only thing keeping me from getting incredibly angry at the system. I agree with Nah here, I'd love to be able to up my legendaries IVs and finish off my 5IVs, but besides that I don't like the system at all.

rest in peace IV breeders lol

edit: IF the caps end up being easy-ish access. if not, well

Nah said:

3) Are there any limitations to how much you can increase a Pokemon's IVs?

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Based on the Serebii page on Hyper Training, I think it's safe to assume the increases aren't limited. If Hyper Training can boost an IV of 5 up to 31 (along with a slew of other low IVs) there's probably no arbitrary cap hidden in there that stops you from boosting values as you please. At the very least, you have much more control (128 points worth of control, in the given example) over your IVs than ever before.

I think your other points are fair, though, at least until we've got more information. I suspect the developers will take Hyper Training into consideration when setting up the game's level curve and postgame areas, and I highly doubt they'd introduce a system like this only to put a set number of bottle caps in the game, but that's all conjecture at this point.

This feature brings nothing but good to the game for legitimate competitve players, now you can get attatched to more Pokemon without having to worry about their IVs and such. This doesn't diminish IV breeding at all, that is still probably the faster and more efficient way of getting good IVs, but this way our maingame Pokemon, Event Pokemon, Legendaries and Shinies aren't left in the dust. And now I can use that Blaziken from my XY that I bred before I knew how to properly breed for IVs.

Edit: I get the whole genes thing, but this is an imaginary world we're talking about here, who cares? Why should some Pokemon not be able to compete with other no matter how hard you train? I know there's still natures we gotta deal with, but with those you can mostly compromise and work with it. With IVs, you generally need 31 aross the board, except for niche situations and hidden powers

This may be easy for me to say because I'm not competitive enough at the game to make use of Hyper Training, but I really think IV training hurts the overall metaphor of IVs. Like people have said, IVs are part of a Pokemon's DNA. From the very beginning, the idea was to make it so that the odds of any two Pokemon being exactly alike were negligible. They wanted a way to make it so that your Pokemon was one of a kind, even if you trade it away and someday it comes back to you. This is less important today than it was in Gen I because there are other distinguishing features of the data structure like the personality value, but I still say IVs are important because idea of your strengths being a product of both your potential and your effort (EVs) is very true to life and is a subtle way of making the game more convincing.

Pokemon is a better game than most at pitting the player's feelings against the player's strategy, and that's a good thing. For example, you can switch in a worthless Pokemon to take a Bide attack and then bring in the one you actually want to fight without having to miss a turn, but then the weak Pokemon will be unhappy. Also, maybe your starter had bad luck in the genetic lottery. When the player learns this, they experience a real tension between their affection for their first Pokemon and their desire to win. That's one of the ways you know Pokemon is a great game. Reaching the pinnacle of competitiveness should have an emotional cost, and getting to feel like the world's kindest trainer should have a competitive cost.

My only remaining question about IV training is this: do boosted IVs get passed down in breeding, or does the data structure keep track of "genetic IV" vs. "boosted IV"? I would definitely prefer the latter.

I don't think it changes the metagame much if at all, actually. Nearly every player who's actually serious about competitive is already either using hacks or playing on a sim. And sets are always made with the assumption of optimal IVs.

However this feature is still incredible for making IVs not a stupid pain in the ass for legitimate players. Having my Pokemon handicapped forever because of RNG was never fun. And the article is right in that it makes competitive play more accessible.

Maybe for GF, IVs is not equal to genes at all. People have limitations, some can achieve something without effort and some just have to struggle hard to overcome their capped limit and go beyond the limit. Hyper Training is one of the revolution way to train your Pokemon beyond their limit.

I feel like the point of the hyper training is for your main game team. Everyone puts together that team of 6 that they love and want to use, but when you get to competitive suddenly those pokemon aren't up to snuff. hyper training seems to solve that, so IDK how many pokemon they intend to let you hyper train. I'd say the minimum is 6, but who knows about max.

I wish they simply got rid of IV's.

ddrox13 said:

The fact that they are already talking about how the first Mythical you get will be holding a bottle cap makes me think that there will be an INCREDIBLY small number. Which is the only thing keeping me from getting incredibly angry at the system. I agree with Nah here, I'd love to be able to up my legendaries IVs and finish off my 5IVs, but besides that I don't like the system at all.

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I think theyll give out small amounts! otherwise every idiot could get perfect 6iv pokemons without knowing SHIT about the game.

I personally think this is thought to be an "addition" so long time fans can make that shiny poke theyve bred hours for only has 2ivs - so THOSE people can get THOSE pokemon into Metagame. or new players can train 2/3 pokemons quick like that to get into meta...

Otherwise it would be bs

He describes it very good, too i think:

Jason Wolf said:

I feel like the point of the hyper training is for your main game team. Everyone puts together that team of 6 that they love and want to use, but when you get to competitive suddenly those pokemon aren't up to snuff. hyper training seems to solve that, so IDK how many pokemon they intend to let you hyper train. I'd say the minimum is 6, but who knows about max.

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I'll probably try this out depending on how easy it is to reach level 100 in S/M. I haven't really got much of an interest in IVs but if this makes it easier then I'm all for it.

What's next, a way to make your Pokémon shiny?
Personally totally against it. I didn't really like the transition from 1/8192 to 1/4096, but that's probably just me being angsty when it comes to change.

Caaethil said:

I agree with the above. I think the article is a bit too full of praise for the system, honestly. I still hate that they're making IVs (genes) changeable, which makes zero sense.

I think people are getting too caught up in what this will do and are forgetting to ask what the best way to do it is.

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You say that as if stuff in the Pokémon world normally makes sense. :p

Well, it doesn't exactly "blow the metagame wide open" per se, but there are some good things coming from it.

Breeders aka legit players:
+ Legendary mons are now easy to get ready for competitive.
+ The same applies to shinies.
+ You don't need to re-breed a non-perfect 5IV mon.
+ You can use the mons with whom you shared the story.
+ Newer breeders, who don't have a good breeding base, can get 6IV mons more easily.

Non-breeders aka cheaters/hackers/genners:
+ Have now a way to get around the "legit mon" hack check, but it takes a bit longer in return. (You don't gen the pokémon directly, but breed it legitimately for nature and egg moves + EV train, and just cheat in Rare Candies and Bottle Caps which are almost untraceable.)

But hey, haters gonna hate, cheaters gonna cheat, and potatoes gonna potate.

clbgolden said:

You say that as if stuff in the Pokémon world normally makes sense. :p

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Stuff in the Pokemon world does normally make sense. There are certain differences, like, of course, the existence of Pokemon, and you have to overlook a few immediate alarm bells like animal cruelty. The Pokemon world is supposed to be very optimistic where those issues don't exist. Aside from that, the Pokemon world functions a lot like our world. It tends to use made up types of energy and such to explain complicated things, but genetics exist. IVs are genetics, and that's why you can never change them. Allowing players to change them is simply against the concept entirely.

When IVs can be changed, they're essentially just EVs with a different name. At that point you might as well just remove IVs because they're pointless.

Let me ask one question to anyone who loves this feature. Do you think IVs will be fun and interesting gameplay now?

Also, to everyone talking about in game teams being viable now, sorry to burst your bubble, but natures.

Caaethil said:

Let me ask one question to anyone who loves this feature. Do you think IVs will be fun and interesting gameplay now?

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I don't really understand the point of the question. IVs were never fun or interesting in competitive play. They all have to be 31 across the board, with very few exceptions. There's no variety or variation from the standard. In competitive play, IVs are simply a barrier to entry - Hyper Training lowers this barrier a bit, which imo will not make competitive play any less fun or interesting.

In-game, when you're just playing casually through the story, IVs are a neat feature. They serve the purpose of making each Pokemon's stats unique. Hyper Training will have no impact on this, since you will only have access to it once you've beaten the game and gotten your Pokemon to max level.

I enjoy IV breeding, I guess there's that?? But IV breeding probably isn't going anywhere. Even if Hyper Training does end up being more efficient (which I doubt), you can still IV breed to your heart's content if you find it more interesting or entertaining.

Caaethil said:

Stuff in the Pokemon world does normally make sense. There are certain differences, like, of course, the existence of Pokemon, and you have to overlook a few immediate alarm bells like animal cruelty. The Pokemon world is supposed to be very optimistic where those issues don't exist. Aside from that, the Pokemon world functions a lot like our world. It tends to use made up types of energy and such to explain complicated things, but genetics exist. IVs are genetics, and that's why you can never change them. Allowing players to change them is simply against the concept entirely.

When IVs can be changed, they're essentially just EVs with a different name. At that point you might as well just remove IVs because they're pointless.

Let me ask one question to anyone who loves this feature. Do you think IVs will be fun and interesting gameplay now?

Also, to everyone talking about in game teams being viable now, sorry to burst your bubble, but natures.

Click to expand...

Normally makes sense? In Pokémon you can hatch an egg that's already a mother with a child, have a whale and cat breed, and give ten year olds fire breathing dragons, among MANY other things.

As for your question, I think it'll definitely make getting IVs more fun now.