[Completed] Pokémon, Pen, & Paper - A Table Top Roleplaying Game!

[Doccit]

Here is a link to the PDF!

This is not a single player PC game. This is a table top roleplaying game, which you can play using just this PDF and 3-8 people. You create characters for the Pokemon world and act out their adventures.

Features:

• A combat system which takes a lot of elements from the systems in the Pokémon video games while moving it closer to what is seen in the anime, and keeping the gameplay lightning-fast.
• A skill system that turns a good portion of the moves in the Pokémon world into field moves like Cut or Surf, and gives players lots of access to
• A character building system which emphasizes the character over the Pokémon, allowing players to have a truly vast collection of them without an equally vast collection of character sheets.
• A pokemon ranch system, which allows players to customize and build up the area where their pokemon are kept while they are not using them, adding things like their own pokemon gyms and radio stations.
• Many other miscellaneous features that allow players to develop their character into any kind seen in the games or anime. You can hunt for fossils, make pokeblock, craft pokeballs from apricorns, and become a master breeder, to name a few.

More pages from the book:

Spoiler:

Previously I had written the game Pokémon Conquest, also found on this forum, and while many enjoyed it the system was very flawed. The system had many limitations, but one that irked me the most was the ability of trainers to only keep one or two pokemon. This was a decision made to allow trainers to heavily customize their pokemon without an incredible amount of time sunk into writing out character sheets. This game is an improvement over Pokemon Conquest in many ways, but it also has shifted in focus from highly allowing for highly detailed and customized pokemon to allowing players to capture and use lots and lots of Pokemon in a tabletop setting. Below here I will describe my design decisions in their relation to Dungeons and Dragons, and my previous game Pokemon Conquest.

Character Building!

Spoiler:

I said earlier that in this game the focus of character building is very much moved onto the trainer and away from the Pokemon. Here is what that means:

When you build a character, you make four choices. Your starting Stats, your starter pokemon, their starting stats, and what two training boons you would like.

First, trainer stats. They are Special Training, Physical Training, Poise, Aptitude, and Attention.
Poise is the social stat, for convincing people to do things, lying and etcetera. Aptitude is for using technology effectively; it represents how quick you are at learning highly specific skills and, importantly, effects how easy it is for you to capture pokemon with pokeballs. Attention is the perception skill, and is used for finding your way in the wilderness and hunting for treasure and rare pokemon.

In this game, unlike Dungeons & Dragons, trainers don't have physical stats like strength and dexterity, because the game is not about that primarily. It is assumed to be roughly equal across all trainers, and when you might make something like a strength or dexterity check (without using your Pokemon to do it for you) you make what is called a human capacity check, where you roll 1d6 and add a set number (5). If you want your character to be personally physically strong, you can take the Black-Belt trainer boon, which among other things gives you a big boost on these human capacity checks.

Those two other skills, Physical Training and Special Training, are about how good you are at commanding your Pokemon. You will gain access to moves that your pokmeon can do which require you to make these checks, and they represent how well you trained your Pokemon in advance. The physical/special distinction corresponds to the distinction between physical and special moves in the Pokemon games, the former being for feats of Pokemon strength and agility, and the latter for feats of magic.

Next is your starter pokemon. As your starter pokemon you can choose any pokemon that is in its first stage of evolution, and not a legendary pokemon. You rank its base stats (which can be found on bulbapedia) form highest to lowest (you break ties) and it has a 6 in its two highest, 5 in its two middle stats, and 4 in its two lowest stats.

In this game, your starter pokemon is your most important pokemon and the one with the most detail. Other pokemon you capture will have only a "high stat" which gives them a boost in battle (I'll talk about that later) but uses your starter pokemon's stats in all of its roles. The rational is that, if you start off with a really strong bond with a tyrunt, you are going to be really good at training pokemon to use physical attacks, and not nearly as good at training pokemon to do special attacks. The kind of pokemon party that you have is in a large part determined by your starter pokemon, and this makes it indispensable.

Aside form the rationale, this allows trainers to capture lots of pokemon and switch them in and out of their party without lots of paper work. When you catch a pokemon, you need only record its species, its type, and its highest stat. I personally think this will make the game much more fun. It lets players be more flexible with their party, switching things up when the situation calls for an adjustment, and is better at emulating the anime where things like pokemon level don't seem to matter. In this game a pokemon is only as good as its trainer, not the other way around.

Subsection: The Boon System

Spoiler:

In this game, you choose two "training boons" at the first level, and one more when you level up. When you level up you can also increase one of your stats by 1, or one of your starter pokemon's stats by one, to a maximum of 10. Creating a theoretical maximum level of 55.

Training boons give players access to moves. Field moves, for out of combat, and combat moves, for in combat. What this means is that if you have a Squirtle that was your starter pokemon, and a Poliwhirl that you've just caught, and the boon Ultimate Water (which lets you use the move hydro pump) then both are capable of using hydro pump when you command them to. The ability to train pokemon to do that move resides with you, and so all of your pokemon (that fulfill certain type and stat requirements of course) are a capable of using it.

Roughly speaking boon confers one field move and three combat moves. There are other boons called personas which basically allow you to trade your opportunity to know a greater breadth of moves for your pokemon to use for other gameplay enhancements. The boon Collector Persona, for example, allows you to make an attention check at pokemon centres once per day to find trades for a specific pokemon you specify before you make the check. If that is more valuable to you than more moves, which it may well be, players are free to take it. The Acclaimed Training boon allows you to spend 6 hours training with your pokemon to evolve it if it would evolve at or below level 30. The legendary training boon (which requires acclaimed training to take) allows you to do evolutions above that level and use mega stones. Evolution isn't as important in this game as it is in the pokemon video games (because base stats aren't as important) and so these boons aren't always important to a build.

The boon system is an extension of the design philosophy that I mentioned earlier: keep individual pokemon simple so that players can have lots of them. You don't have to keep track of what moves a pokemon knows or its level. Your capabilities as a trainer determine what it can do for you.

Combat!

Spoiler:

Unlike dungeons and dragons, there is no grid or sense of position in this game. The idea of melee vs ranged attacks isn't really used in the Pokemon universe, and I'd like to note that before the 3rd edition of Dungeons and Dragons, no grid was used either. It seemed more prudent to me to just have relative position in the battle be left up to the imagination of the players and the game master rather than have it be a central feature of combat.

Like Pokemon Conquest, before the round begins everyone writes down their action, and then the actions play out in speed order. Not only does this add the dimension of predicting what your opponent will do in combat, which is such a big element of competitive pokemon battling, but it speeds combat up and ensures everyone always has something to do during combat because all of the deliberation about what to do happens at one time, for the players and the game master.

This game, unlike my previous game, has rolling to hit. The fact that attacks hit automatically in the previous game was one of the most frequent complaints about it, and aside form that, randomness is a big part of the Pokemon video games. I decided to inject a fair bit of it, and it now interacts very interestingly with damage.

Attacks, unless they have special effects that say otherwise (which many do), all deal the same damage: 2. Super effective ones deal 3, not very effective ones deal 1, and not effective attacks deal 0. When you are rolling to hit, you roll 2d6, and add your attack stat (in the case of a physical attack) or special attack stat (in the case of a special attack). Compare that to 10+ the pokemon you are targeting's defence or special defence.

This leads to scenarios in which attacks miss more often than they hit. This is because most pokemon other than your starter pokemon have 2hp. Your starter pokemon has HP equal to its hitpoints stat, so a lot of battles will turn on the starter pokemon.

Advantages and disadvantages often come into play in these rolls. (On an advantage, roll 3d6 and use the 2 highest dice, on a disadvantage use the two lowest). Using an attack that shares a type with the pokemon using it gives you an advantage on the roll to hit. I mentioned earlier that each pokemon has a "high stat" (one of its two highest stats that you choose when you capture the pokemon) that confers an effect in battle. Here they are:

Hitpoints - +1 HP. This makes all the difference when a pokemon has 2hp to begin with. They can take two hits unless an attack is super effective, unlike most pokemon who can take only one.
Attack - gives you an advantage on physical attack rolls
Special attack - gives you an advantage on special attack rolls.
Defence - gives those attacking you a disadvantage on physical attack rolls (advantage an disadvantage cancel each other out)
Special defence - same as above but for special attack rolls.
Speed - Your speed is 3 higher while this is your active pokemon.

While this may appear random at first, it is actually relatively consistent. Because most of the time you will be at an advantage or a disadvantage, the range of numbers you will usually be in shrinks considerably from the normal range when rolling without one. There are miracles and flukes that happen every once in a while, but they don't define the game. I spent a great deal of time analyzing this (and a great deal of time battling on Pokemon Showdown unrelatedly to this project), and I think I have created a reasonable facsimile for the strategic complexity in pokemon battles while massively reducing the complexity such that it can be done in a tabletop setting at great speed.

Skills!

Spoiler:

I've gone over most of what is worth saying in the previous sections, but in this game there are two sets of stats: the player's stats which are entirely for out of combat applications, and their starter pokemon's stats, which are entirely for combat. Of the player's five stats (Aptitude, Poise, Attention, Physical Training, & Special Training) Two can only be used in conjunction with field moves picked up by taking boons (physical training and special training. Are they underpowered? No. Because while you don't have a lot of checks to make with them at the beginning, the checks you can make are to do stuff like breathe a bunch of fire or control and summon vines from your pokemon. That is more powerful, if perhaps less versatile, than the other skills right off of the bat. So is it overpowered? I wouldn't say so. If you want to dumpstat them both, you can and still you will be able to find lots of magical pokemon abilities that you are perfectly competent at using (ones that require no checks). If you want to make a pokemon training that is really good at using technology (high aptitude) but really bad at teaching pokemon to fly you around or punch holes in walls, you won't weigh down your party. There are many situations in which the things that aptitude allows you to do (hacking computers, using pokeballs better, fishing, making pokeblock, finding treasure with a dowsing machine, and basically using all other items in the game) is more useful than what you could be doing with your pokemon.

In essence the skill system is a few attribute rolls, supported by gaining new skill checks to make as you level up (through boons and items). I like it because the understanding required to interact with it is minimal, and it allows the player to increase the complexity of their interactions with it as they level up. One of the things that bothers me about all editions of dungeons and dragons is the amount of rules that players could interact with if they chose to without being ability dependent. This meant that to make the most of your character, even if you were a wizard, you should really read the rules for bull rushing, and sundering, and oh god grappling, and remember that you can make melee basic attacks if you don't want to use your at will powers, and that you can convert move actions into minor actions, and a whole host of other things. I'm mixing editions here but you get the point. In this game players unlock the ability to interact with systems by taking boons, (and/or buying expensive items) instead of having the whole book thrown at them at the first level. It makes it a lot easier to learn to play.

 

[YourFavorite]

Oh hey, I saw this a while ago and I thought I was going to post something here, but I guess I forgot. ^ ^;

I saw this on the Pokemon Tabletop forums, so I took a look. I really like the rules-light nature of the game, and the combat. I think it's a really newbie-friendly way to get Pokemon fans into tabletop RPG's, and am definitely going to have to try it out sometime, even if it's only running a one-shot. I think it's a huge improvement from the Pokemon Conquest system, and am happy to see you still developing tabletop systems. :3

I hope people on here who haven't tried tabletopping will give this a shot; as a lifelong video-gamer, tabletop games are probably the most fun I've had gaming, period.

 

[epicmaster204]

are you gonna keep adding stuff to this
it seems cool.