Hack Series: Pokémon Photonic Sun & Prismatic Moon

[Dias200]

Heya again o/ So uh... I decided to do try to come up with tweaks of my own in Ultra Sun/Ultra Moon. These are mostly just to test things and see what stick, and although I'm putting them here, I'm not sure you should count them as suggestions for the hack, since most of these are pretty nuts >.<
Here are the changes I made atm
-Roar of Time (Dialga's Signature move) has become a "twin move" of Spacial Rend (SR for short)
It's Power was reduced to 100 (just like SR) and it's accuracy increased to 95% (again, just like SR)... No longer has a recharge turn and now has a 30% chance to flinch the opponent (this is the only part that differs it from SR)
-Shadow Force (Giratina's Signature move) now makes the target faint in 3 turns after the hit. (Imagine a Perish Song that only affects the opposing pokémon BUT needs 2 turns to actually do it)... Also, it's power was also reduced to 100.

-Dunsparce = Poison/Dragon
80 atk 90 def sp.a 95 sp.d 90 speed 45
New moves: Dragon Rage at 11, Dragon Dance at 16, Cross Poison at 28, Dragon Claw, Draco Meteor, Dragon Pulse, Sludge Bomb, Sludge Wave and Dragon Tail

-Shuckle
+40 in hp, - 20 in both defenses... That's it for Shuckle
Lastly and the BIGGEST AND CRAZIEST:

-Furfrou With Tough Claws as 2nd ability
New moves: Drill Run, Swords Dance, Aqua Tail, Hyper Fang at 27, Crunch at 30
If this doesn't sound so big or crazy, wait... there is more! Each Trim CHANGES IT'S SECOND TYPE, ABILITY, SOME MOVES AND SOME TRIMS EVEN CHANGE BASE STATS! Of course I can't force the game to never change the trims back to OG, and if you learn a move from Trim A it can be transfered to Trim B, but still... I would suggest to keeping a Furfrou in the same one all the time, more for the idea sake... I wouldn't stop people from doing that tho (since I can't to begin with >.>)
-Heart Trim (Nornal/Fairy) with Misty Surge as 2nd ability, atk and sp.a are swapped
New moves: Disarming Voice at Lvl 1, Moonblast at 27, Dazzling Gleam, Focus Blast, Aura Sphere, Energy Ball
-Star Trim (Normal/Electric) with Electric Surge as 2nd ability
New moves: Poison Fang at 25, Thunder Fang and Hyper Fang at 27, Crunch at 30, Drill Run
-Diamond Trim (Normal/Rock) with Solid Rock as 2nd ability, def and spd are swapped
New moves: Stone Edge, Drill Run, Stealth Rock, Rock Polish, Hyper Fang at 27
-Debutante Trim (Normal) with PROTEAN as 2nd ability, atk and sp.a are swapped (again)
New moves: Flash Cannon, Scald, Aura Sphere, Energy Ball, Focus Blast... Also learns Hyper Voice at 27 (though it isn't a NEW move)
-Matron Trim (Normal/Psychic) with Psychic Surge as 2nd ability, atk and sp.a are swapped (yet again)
New moves: Psyshock, Psychic (also learns it at 27), Shadow Ball, Energy Ball, Aura Sphere
-Dandy Trim (Normal/Bug) with Thick Fat as 2nd ability
New moves: Leech Life, Hyper Fang at 27, Crunch at 30, Drill Run, Foul Play
-La Reine Trim (Normal/Ice) with Snow Warning as 2nd ability, atk and sp.a are swapped (one more time)
New moves: Ice Beam (also learned at 27), Freeze-Dry, Aura Sphere, Focus Blast, Scald
-Kabuki Trim (Normal/Fire) with Drought as 2nd ability
New moves: Fire Fang and Hyper Fang at 27, Crunch at 30, Flare Blitz at 35, Drill Run
-Pharaoh Trim (Normal/Ground) with Sand Stream as 2nd ability, atk and sp.a are swapped (last time)
New moves: Sludge Bomb, Earth Power(also learned at 27), Energy Ball, Focus Blast, Aura Sphere
Sorry for the big wall of text, just wanted to share these crazy ideas and see what you think >.<

 

[Ankhr]

Potential bug:
So for Mina's trial, Sophocles just gives you the Yellow Petal without a battle. Is that intentional? In the documentation, it shows that he should have a team of lvl 93s.

Here's a comparison of someone's playthrough of Prismatic Moon: youtu.be/3-zM3Rm9vRQ?t=3830
and a regular playthrough of Ultra Moon: youtu.be/d4otCgzGrzg?t=2038

 

[Buffel Saft]

Heya again o/ So uh... I decided to do try to come up with tweaks of my own in Ultra Sun/Ultra Moon. These are mostly just to test things and see what stick, and although I'm putting them here, I'm not sure you should count them as suggestions for the hack, since most of these are pretty nuts >.<
Here are the changes I made atm
-Roar of Time (Dialga's Signature move) has become a "twin move" of Spacial Rend (SR for short)
It's Power was reduced to 100 (just like SR) and it's accuracy increased to 95% (again, just like SR)... No longer has a recharge turn and now has a 30% chance to flinch the opponent (this is the only part that differs it from SR)
-Shadow Force (Giratina's Signature move) now makes the target faint in 3 turns after the hit. (Imagine a Perish Song that only affects the opposing pokémon BUT needs 2 turns to actually do it)... Also, it's power was also reduced to 100.

-Dunsparce = Poison/Dragon
80 atk 90 def sp.a 95 sp.d 90 speed 45
New moves: Dragon Rage at 11, Dragon Dance at 16, Cross Poison at 28, Dragon Claw, Draco Meteor, Dragon Pulse, Sludge Bomb, Sludge Wave and Dragon Tail

-Shuckle
+40 in hp, - 20 in both defenses... That's it for Shuckle
Lastly and the BIGGEST AND CRAZIEST:

-Furfrou With Tough Claws as 2nd ability
New moves: Drill Run, Swords Dance, Aqua Tail, Hyper Fang at 27, Crunch at 30
If this doesn't sound so big or crazy, wait... there is more! Each Trim CHANGES IT'S SECOND TYPE, ABILITY, SOME MOVES AND SOME TRIMS EVEN CHANGE BASE STATS! Of course I can't force the game to never change the trims back to OG, and if you learn a move from Trim A it can be transfered to Trim B, but still... I would suggest to keeping a Furfrou in the same one all the time, more for the idea sake... I wouldn't stop people from doing that tho (since I can't to begin with >.>)
-Heart Trim (Nornal/Fairy) with Misty Surge as 2nd ability, atk and sp.a are swapped
New moves: Disarming Voice at Lvl 1, Moonblast at 27, Dazzling Gleam, Focus Blast, Aura Sphere, Energy Ball
-Star Trim (Normal/Electric) with Electric Surge as 2nd ability
New moves: Poison Fang at 25, Thunder Fang and Hyper Fang at 27, Crunch at 30, Drill Run
-Diamond Trim (Normal/Rock) with Solid Rock as 2nd ability, def and spd are swapped
New moves: Stone Edge, Drill Run, Stealth Rock, Rock Polish, Hyper Fang at 27
-Debutante Trim (Normal) with PROTEAN as 2nd ability, atk and sp.a are swapped (again)
New moves: Flash Cannon, Scald, Aura Sphere, Energy Ball, Focus Blast... Also learns Hyper Voice at 27 (though it isn't a NEW move)
-Matron Trim (Normal/Psychic) with Psychic Surge as 2nd ability, atk and sp.a are swapped (yet again)
New moves: Psyshock, Psychic (also learns it at 27), Shadow Ball, Energy Ball, Aura Sphere
-Dandy Trim (Normal/Bug) with Thick Fat as 2nd ability
New moves: Leech Life, Hyper Fang at 27, Crunch at 30, Drill Run, Foul Play
-La Reine Trim (Normal/Ice) with Snow Warning as 2nd ability, atk and sp.a are swapped (one more time)
New moves: Ice Beam (also learned at 27), Freeze-Dry, Aura Sphere, Focus Blast, Scald
-Kabuki Trim (Normal/Fire) with Drought as 2nd ability
New moves: Fire Fang and Hyper Fang at 27, Crunch at 30, Flare Blitz at 35, Drill Run
-Pharaoh Trim (Normal/Ground) with Sand Stream as 2nd ability, atk and sp.a are swapped (last time)
New moves: Sludge Bomb, Earth Power(also learned at 27), Energy Ball, Focus Blast, Aura Sphere
Sorry for the big wall of text, just wanted to share these crazy ideas and see what you think >.<

That Roar of Time change is fine, doesn't really matter if a box legendary becomes even stronger. Have you tested the Shadow Force change in game? Usually adding a non-damaging effect to a damaging move doesn't work, would be interesting to see what's different about Perish Song if it does work.

I guess that typing for Dunsparce comes from the snake-like thing it's based on? Definitely stronger than normal typing!

The Furfrou changes are pretty crazy 😅; personally I'm not a big fan of type changes for its trims, but at least they're creative! Also, why Drill Run? It works with Tough Claws but generally if a Pokemon doesn't have some sort of horn or beak it can't learn Drill Run (except Lycanroc).

Potential bug:
So for Mina's trial, Sophocles just gives you the Yellow Petal without a battle. Is that intentional? In the documentation, it shows that he should have a team of lvl 93s.

Here's a comparison of someone's playthrough of Prismatic Moon: youtu.be/3-zM3Rm9vRQ?t=3830
and a regular playthrough of Ultra Moon: youtu.be/d4otCgzGrzg?t=2038

Hey, that's normal. That playthrough is actually Ultra Sun, and that Sophocles battle is a version exclusive for it. In Ultra Moon he just gives you the petal.

 

[Dias200]

Actually, yeah I tested the Shadow Force with Perish Song effect and it worked, this is the settings I used to get it working:
https://imgur.com/Ze5k2aS
The typing for Dunsparce was indeed because of that xD
Lastly, the only reason for Drill Run on Furfrou was cause I thought of Lycanroc >.<

 

[Buffel Saft]

Actually, yeah I tested the Shadow Force with Perish Song effect and it worked, this is the settings I used to get it working:
https://imgur.com/Ze5k2aS
The typing for Dunsparce was indeed because of that xD
Lastly, the only reason for Drill Run on Furfrou was cause I thought of Lycanroc >.<

That's interesting, it just counts as a status effect like poison and the rest.
Haha that's fair enough, I don't know why Lycanroc gets Drill Run in the first place.

 

[NuclearNecro]

Oh I ended up learning a Pokemon addition that's in the Gen 8 games that wasn't ported over to the rom hack, it being that Garbodor learns Cross Poison via TM in Sword and Shield, while it doesn't learn it in here. Adding that as a move in its learn pool could give it a reliable STAB that doesn't have near Focus Blast accuracy.

 

[Giovanni Boss]

Hello again, Buffel. :D

I was wondering how many new Pokémon have access to Defiant while scrolling through the Pokémon changes, and wanted to ask how to you feel about making some more little creatures having access to it as an option. Some nice cute little options would be: Toxicroak line, replacing Anticipation, Krookodile line, replacing Anger Point, Skuntank line, replacing Keen Eye (I guess Stench would be better to replace, but how could one take the stench away from the skunks, right? XD), Zangoose, replacing one of the Immunity slots, Shiftry line, replacing Early Bird, Tauros, replacing Anger Point, Dodrio line, replacing Tangled Feet, Gallade, replacing Steadfast, Hitmonchan, replacing Inner Focus, Scrafty line, replacing I don't really know, all three abilities fit the line way too well xD, Pangoro line, replacing... Well, there's the Scrafty problem all over again, though Pangoro wouldn't miss Scrappy too much, and Tsareena, replacing Leaf Guard.

Obviously, the idea isn't to give the ability to them all, just decided to enumerate everyone I could think as a good candidate. I always like to read your reasoning for the changes, so I thought this was a nice conversation topic. :D

 

[Buffel Saft]

Oh I ended up learning a Pokemon addition that's in the Gen 8 games that wasn't ported over to the rom hack, it being that Garbodor learns Cross Poison via TM in Sword and Shield, while it doesn't learn it in here. Adding that as a move in its learn pool could give it a reliable STAB that doesn't have near Focus Blast accuracy.

Yeah I would've missed quite a few, there were a lot of changes. I'll give Garbodor access to Cross Poison and go through all the other physical Poison types to make sure they get either that or Poison Jab. Turns out quite a few of them rely on the Poison Jab TM, and that's in a pretty silly place so they're just stuck with Gunk Shot.

Hello again, Buffel. :D

I was wondering how many new Pokémon have access to Defiant while scrolling through the Pokémon changes, and wanted to ask how to you feel about making some more little creatures having access to it as an option. Some nice cute little options would be: Toxicroak line, replacing Anticipation, Krookodile line, replacing Anger Point, Skuntank line, replacing Keen Eye (I guess Stench would be better to replace, but how could one take the stench away from the skunks, right? XD), Zangoose, replacing one of the Immunity slots, Shiftry line, replacing Early Bird, Tauros, replacing Anger Point, Dodrio line, replacing Tangled Feet, Gallade, replacing Steadfast, Hitmonchan, replacing Inner Focus, Scrafty line, replacing I don't really know, all three abilities fit the line way too well xD, Pangoro line, replacing... Well, there's the Scrafty problem all over again, though Pangoro wouldn't miss Scrappy too much, and Tsareena, replacing Leaf Guard.

Obviously, the idea isn't to give the ability to them all, just decided to enumerate everyone I could think as a good candidate. I always like to read your reasoning for the changes, so I thought this was a nice conversation topic. :D

Hey Giovanni! Looks like it's just the Samurott line and Midnight Lycanroc, so I guess I could give it to a couple more mons. Out of your suggestions I'd go with Tauros (Anger Point fits so well already, but Defiant is better in USUM seeing as it's mostly single battles), Hitmonchan and Zangoose. Scrafty's a good candidate too but I have to agree it already has three really good abilities, I wouldn't replace any of them.

 

[AngelovanHaren]

Hi, i just played it and my game freezes when i talk to the (first) pokemarkt employee. the music continues but the game is frozen.
any idea what it might be?

 

[Buffel Saft]

Hi, i just played it and my game freezes when i talk to the (first) pokemarkt employee. the music continues but the game is frozen.
any idea what it might be?

Hey, 99% of the time that means the hack isn't installed properly - this will always happen if the official update for the game isn't installed with the hack. If that's the case, then you can follow the install guide (don't worry, it's a quick and easy process) and that will fix the issue. If not, which version of the hack were you playing? If it's an issue with the files I can make a fix for it.

 

[AngelovanHaren]

ah, i see the problem. i had the hack installed before installing the 1.2 update. removing the hack from the mod folder, restarting the game, closing the game and re-adding it worked.

 

[Buffel Saft]

ah, i see the problem. i had the hack installed before installing the 1.2 update. removing the hack from the mod folder, restarting the game, closing the game and re-adding it worked.

That's interesting, I didn't think the order mattered; not sure what else it would be though. Glad it's working now!

 

[xozacqwerty]

Hey, I wanted to say that I'm enjoying the hack very much so far. The difficulty is very good for a nuzlocke, you drop a few mons here and there and yet the difficulty isn't ridiculous to the point where grinding is necessary.

One thing that I've noticed though is that there doesn't seem to be an option to have the 8th gen movepool changes for the standard version, is that something you're interested in adding or does that not fit with your vision of standard?

 

[james19]

Hi Buffel, hope you're doing great! Well, I see I don't have last version of Photonic Sun, so it's time to update hehe.

BTW how is your Emerald Hack doing?

 

[Buffel Saft]

Hey, I wanted to say that I'm enjoying the hack very much so far. The difficulty is very good for a nuzlocke, you drop a few mons here and there and yet the difficulty isn't ridiculous to the point where grinding is necessary.

One thing that I've noticed though is that there doesn't seem to be an option to have the 8th gen movepool changes for the standard version, is that something you're interested in adding or does that not fit with your vision of standard?

Hey, I'm happy to hear that! It might get a little rough later on (Ultra Necrozma can quite easily end a nuzlocke if you're not prepared for it), but hopefully you won't ever need to grind.

The idea with the standard version is that everything you and your opponents have (except the two cheating bosses in the post game) is something you could legitimately have in USUM, so the gen 8 moves wouldn't fit into that. As they're official changes I can see the argument for including them though, so maybe that could be an optional extra in a later version.

Hi Buffel, hope you're doing great! Well, I see I don't have last version of Photonic Sun, so it's time to update hehe.

BTW how is your Emerald Hack doing?

Hey James! I'm doing good, hope all's well with you too. Emerald's coming along nicely; I'm currently working on Route 119 (just need to edit a few more trainers and do something about the Feebas tiles). It'd be further along but I got a bit sidetracked while adding egg move transferal and wound up adding the entire gen VIII breeding system while I was there 😅:

It's not necessary to breed to get "perfect" Pokemon, but it's a good way to get more of them as hyper trained IVs can be passed down while breeding.
I'm looking at end of November/early December as a tentative release date for the main game, with a Battle Frontier update following early next year and GenVIII + the rest of the post game "soon" after.

 

[NuclearNecro]

Nice to see that the Emerald hack is going well, and it's also cool to know that the Gen 8 breeding is in there, maybe it will make breeding useful for me. Aside from that, I got some more balance changes coming up, just to give some more Pokemon a bit of spicing up.

- Grant Octillery Mega Launcher instead of Sniper, as well as moves that can benefit from it (mainly Dragon Pulse and Aura Sphere). Honestly, I'm surprised that it wasn't done already, due to Octillery being based off of a tank cannon in its design, name in Japanese (with the English version being based on artillery), and it having such a massive amount of beam and bullet moves. And since Sniper is an ability that doesn't really work with Octillery, it won't hurt to replace it.

- Give Alolan Persian, and possibly Alolan Meowth access to Snarl in their level-up movesets. Snarl is a move that normally these two would have pretty easy access to, since normally by the time you get it they're at pretty low levels. But in the rom hack, they will only get the move when they're at level 50-60. And until said point, they have NO special Dark STAB to use, with Persian being somewhat able to squeeze by with Foul Play. This doesn't let them use their beefed up Special Attack on their STAB until much later. Giving them Snarl via level up could remove said issue, and won't force them to rely on Power Gem and Swift for half the game.

 

[MarcusPwnz]

Hey Buffel, Great job on the hack! Having a blast playing through it so far! :)

Is it possible to enable version exclusive battles in the Battle Tree regardless of what version of the hack you're on? Eg. Guzma in Photonic Sun when he usually only appears in Moon/Ultra Moon.

Or even just add more Pokémon to the list that trainers are assigned at random? Eg. Furret

 

[james19]

Hey James! I'm doing good, hope all's well with you too. Emerald's coming along nicely; I'm currently working on Route 119 (just need to edit a few more trainers and do something about the Feebas tiles). It'd be further along but I got a bit sidetracked while adding egg move transferal and wound up adding the entire gen VIII breeding system while I was there 😅:

It's not necessary to breed to get "perfect" Pokemon, but it's a good way to get more of them as hyper trained IVs can be passed down while breeding.
I'm looking at end of November/early December as a tentative release date for the main game, with a Battle Frontier update following early next year and GenVIII + the rest of the post game "soon" after.

Looks amazing!. If you're planing to make BF a place to go, it's a fantastic idea to overhaul the lame breeding system of Gen III so it's easy to test teams and win symbols. And the "Gen 8 post game" sounds very promising. Can't wait to try it out, but take your time, we know you deliver good things in the end man

 

[Buffel Saft]

Nice to see that the Emerald hack is going well, and it's also cool to know that the Gen 8 breeding is in there, maybe it will make breeding useful for me. Aside from that, I got some more balance changes coming up, just to give some more Pokemon a bit of spicing up.

- Grant Octillery Mega Launcher instead of Sniper, as well as moves that can benefit from it (mainly Dragon Pulse and Aura Sphere). Honestly, I'm surprised that it wasn't done already, due to Octillery being based off of a tank cannon in its design, name in Japanese (with the English version being based on artillery), and it having such a massive amount of beam and bullet moves. And since Sniper is an ability that doesn't really work with Octillery, it won't hurt to replace it.

- Give Alolan Persian, and possibly Alolan Meowth access to Snarl in their level-up movesets. Snarl is a move that normally these two would have pretty easy access to, since normally by the time you get it they're at pretty low levels. But in the rom hack, they will only get the move when they're at level 50-60. And until said point, they have NO special Dark STAB to use, with Persian being somewhat able to squeeze by with Foul Play. This doesn't let them use their beefed up Special Attack on their STAB until much later. Giving them Snarl via level up could remove said issue, and won't force them to rely on Power Gem and Swift for half the game.

It'll be better than gen 3 breeding at least! I actually considered Mega Launcher for Octillery; decided against it in the end because we already have two slow, bulky water types with the ability, so I thought it'd be a little redundant. Also, it already has a very colorful movepool for a water type as is, so I didn't think it needed even more options. It's definitely a fitting option for it though!

100% agreed on the Alolan Meowth line, good suggestion! I'll give them earlier access to Dark Pulse too.

Hey Buffel, Great job on the hack! Having a blast playing through it so far! :)

Is it possible to enable version exclusive battles in the Battle Tree regardless of what version of the hack you're on? Eg. Guzma in Photonic Sun when he usually only appears in Moon/Ultra Moon.

Or even just add more Pokémon to the list that trainers are assigned at random? Eg. Furret

Hey Marcus, thanks! It's definitely possible but it's beyond my abilities; I think those would be ASM changes, which I can't do in a 3DS game. That said, you should be able to play the version exclusive battles by loading up your save on the opposite version, as saves from Ultra Moon work with Ultra Sun, and vice versa. Kind of a pain having both versions set up just for that though!

Looks amazing!. If you're planing to make BF a place to go, it's a fantastic idea to overhaul the lame breeding system of Gen III so it's easy to test teams and win symbols. And the "Gen 8 post game" sounds very promising. Can't wait to try it out, but take your time, we know you deliver good things in the end man

Thanks! Yeah, a modernized frontier combined with ways to get frontier ready Pokemon should be a lot of fun. Don't worry, I'm definitely not rushing it! Most of the big feature changes are done now, so there's not much left to do in the main game.

 

[WorldGuard_01]

Hey Buffel! I was wondering, how much work would it take to implement the exp candies and nature mints from SWSH? If it's possible, maybe the xp candies could be added into the Pelago's mining island, maybe even a separate path for it just for them?
As for the nature mints, I dont know. Battle Tree, I guess?