Changing the way starters are given

[Broskinator97]

Hi everyone, I'm basically entering the disassembly hacking world, and the first thing that has come to my mind is if there was a way to change how Birch gives the player the starter. Basically I would like to erase the whole "Poochyena runs behind Birch" replacing it with some scene in the Lab where it gives you the possibility to choose between more than the same 3 Pokemons, I haven't decided the exact number yet.
Is it possible to do? And would it be difficult for someone who is basically new to this king of hacking?

 

[ellabrella]

If I were doing this, I'd probably try to recreate what FireRed has through scripting. Basically, use PoryMap to erase all the events on Route 101 that deal with the starter event, and just script some plain pokeball events in Birch's lab that give the player a pokemon. I imagine it'd be a lot more difficult to make something sophisticated like Emerald's starter picking screen.

 

[Broskinator97]

Do you think there could be a way to create a random encounter in the grass between a set group of Pokemons? Because I was thinking about two alternate ways of getting the starter but don't know what could be the simples

 

[Mab]

Do you think there could be a way to create a random encounter in the grass between a set group of Pokemons? Because I was thinking about two alternate ways of getting the starter but don't know what could be the simples

What do you mean between a set group of Pokémon? Do you mean like, the Poocheyana battle but it's a random one of a preset list of Pokémon?

 

[Hestia]

You could reuse the Wally Ralts functions, change the Species_ralts to some other species, and use the givepokemon command afterwards. This does not preserve shinyness, but it is easy.

 

[Broskinator97]

What do you mean between a set group of Pokémon? Do you mean like, the Poocheyana battle but it's a random one of a preset list of Pokémon?

You could reuse the Wally Ralts functions, change the Species_ralts to some other species, and use the givepokemon command afterwards. This does not preserve shinyness, but it is easy.

Basically I would like to have the PG getting the starter battling in the wild against a pokemon that can be "random" in a group of 10 different species for example, but I don't know if it's something that could be done

 

[Hestia]

Basically I would like to have the PG getting the starter battling in the wild against a pokemon that can be "random" in a group of 10 different species for example, but I don't know if it's something that could be done

It is not very clear what you are asking for, especially "have the PG getting the starter battling in the wild against a pokemon".

How are you going to battle a wild monster if you have no starter yet? If you want a lone pokemon, it is relatively easy like in my previous post, reuse the wally tutorial change his sprite to yours. Go to

battle_setup.c

and

void StartWallyTutorialBattle(void)(

and change the SPECIES_RALTS to a random entry. You do that by making a table somewhere (in battle_setup for example) like:

const u16 starters[] = {
    SPECIES_SLUGMA,
    SPECIES_SENTRET,
    SPECIES_FARFETCHD,
};

and change SPECIES_RALTS to starters[Random() % 3] where the number is the numbers of possible starters you want to have.

If you want to have something like in pokemon yellow or something like in the safari zone it's going to be a lot harder.

 

[UltimaSoul]

It is important to note that Emerald also has scripts for selecting starters via script similar to FRLG for the Johto starters that are given out when you complete the Hoenn dex.