Chit-Chat: ROM Hacking Daily Chit Chat

[Satoshi Ookami]

What do you guys think about the type effectiveness thing being changed in hacks? Like making water weak to posion and stuff like that? Do you like that or does it ruin it for you, or are you indifferent to it?

I believe that official things should be left untouched so... I don't like this kind of change.

 

[machomuu]

What do you guys think about the type effectiveness thing being changed in hacks? Like making water weak to posion and stuff like that? Do you like that or does it ruin it for you, or are you indifferent to it?

Y'know, that's part of the reason that I can't get into Touhoumon 1.8. They change all of the types to things like Reason, Wind, etc...and the problem with this is...well...they changed ALL the types. With the Pokemon games, they based the elements off of real things so effectiveness at least made a good amount of sense. You understood why Water beat Fire and Fire beat grass, it just made sense. And the Pokemon as well, you could tell just by looking that Bulbasaur was a grass type or Rattata was a normal type. This is why Red and Blue didn't have any handholding (except for when using pokeballs), it pushed the player to try things and learn on their own. Even with the previous Touhoumon version where they used the original typing, you would be able to tell in the same way.

But with 1.8, everything's changed. Everything that you learned over the years, months, days, or hours you spent playing Pokemon is turned on its head, and because the ideas behind the typings are so abstract and different, it makes it much more difficult to get into. Does Heart type beat Illusion type? How about Fire, how does that affect Reason? It takes a lot of trial, error, and reviewing the type chart to get together, even if you're an avid Touhou fan that understands the meaning behind some of the typings (since Touhoumon games tend to have in-jokes and references)

I really think that if you're going to change type, you really should go along with RBGY's method and REALLY be careful about doing so even then (be sure it makes sense and don't go against the user's common sense...unless that's the point), or if you don't and you're using Fire Red, use the Teachy TV to at least give the player a portable guide for what is affected by what.

 

[Crocky]

What do you guys think about the type effectiveness thing being changed in hacks? Like making water weak to posion and stuff like that? Do you like that or does it ruin it for you, or are you indifferent to it?

I dislike it unless the changes are made to bring the type effectiveness chart up to generation 6 standard. I tend to like Pokémon hacks better if they don't divert too far off from what an official Nintendo game would be like, so stuff like fakemon and random changes in the type chart are a huge no-no to me.

 

[Typhlosion4Lyfe]

Hi all (^_^)/ I'm new here, I don't know ANYTHING about ROM hacking, but I really want to learn! I hate to ask you this, but would one of you guys teach me? :)

 

[Spherical Ice]

Hi all (^_^)/ I'm new here, I don't know ANYTHING about ROM hacking, but I really want to learn! I hate to ask you this, but would one of you guys teach me? :)

In the long-term, it'd be much more useful for you to learn for yourself. That said, don't fear! You can go and post a thread in the Beginner's Lounge subforum where you can practically any (ROM Hacking-related) questions you want, including asking advice for beginners and such.

That said, I would advise you to download tools like AdvanceMap (1.9.2), XSE (1.1.1), the G3HS, and a few other tools that I can't think of at the moment. If you are unsure of how to do something, check out the Tools, Tutorials and Resources subforum to see if there is a tool or tutorial that can help you out, and if you're still not sure, post a thread in the Beginner's Lounge.

You can also feel free to drop me a PM or VM if you want help, too!

 

[Typhlosion4Lyfe]

Thanks so much! And ok, I'm doing this on my phone, can I download those on here? ROM hacking sounds like a great hobby, I really wanna lol into it

 

[Spherical Ice]

I'm not sure ROM hacking on your phone is ideal, most tools are only compatible with PCs, and usually Windows at that, too, unfortunately. That said, there are some new alternative multi-platform tools being developed, such as MEH, but they would not operate on phones and I doubt that will ever be the case, unfortunately.

 

[Typhlosion4Lyfe]

Oh ok, well luckily I have a PC with Windows 8 so I'll try to download everything I need when I can, meanwhile, is they're a tutorial somewhere on how to start? (Oh and sorry for bothering btw)

 

[DrFuji]

ROM Hacking is now its own section, free from the oppressive yoke of Creative Discussions! We've moved up in the world! Whoop whoop.

What do you guys think about the type effectiveness thing being changed in hacks? Like making water weak to posion and stuff like that? Do you like that or does it ruin it for you, or are you indifferent to it?

I don't think the type effectiveness table should be changed, so long as no new types have been added to the game. Like others have stated before me, if you add a new type then things might be unbalanced, so I can see some minor changes being absolutely fine. I know that when types are changed it can be very hard to adjust to them/ keep in mind so the entire experience can become very jarring for the player. Its better to keep the status quo in my opinion.

 

[Danny0317]

What do you guys think about when people boost legendarie's stats like they did in dark rising for difficulty. I think that was bad.

 

[Spherical Ice]

It's particularly dumb when subtoxic and such strategies exist. Artificial difficulty is just plain lazy, to be honest.

 

[machomuu]

It depends, really. I think that it can be great for games that have actual boss fights (as in the player fights a single enemy with high stats). In the hack I'm planning, the bosses have high HP and relatively high stats in other areas. Of course, my hack isn't Pokemon (though it is a hack of Pokemon), so you can't capture them, but what this does is emulate boss fights in...pretty much any other game that isn't Pokemon, which is more dependent on team strength than strength of the individual.

But for a Pokemon hack where the legendary is catchable, I think it's a bad idea. I haven't played Dark Rising (though I have seen a lot of people blatantly give it a hard time, which I'm pretty surprised at), so I don't know what specific examples you may be referring to, but if they used it for the sake of boss design, I don't really see a problem with it. How "boosted" are we talking?

 

[Hiatus]

What do you guys think about when people boost legendarie's stats like they did in dark rising for difficulty. I think that was bad.

I'm not really fond of that. :( When I play a hack, I do it only for fun and enjoyment, and not any challenge of sorts. For those who'd like it, it'd be really nice if ROM hackers could create a separate version with increased difficulty.

 

[machomuu]

I'm not really fond of that. :( When I play a hack, I do it only for fun and enjoyment, and not any challenge of sorts. For those who'd like it, it'd be really nice if ROM hackers could create a separate version with increased difficulty.

Difficulty? Hold on, I'm lost here. When there was mention of legendaries' stats being boosted for difficulty, I assumed we were talking bosses. You guys got any examples you can throw out?

 

[DoesntKnowHowToPlay]

Dark Rising only ever boosted legendary stats on the E4, where, in addition to being comically over-leveled like everything else in the hack, you had to deal with 800+ BST legendaries stuck in the middle of full teams- the champ then proceeded to use all of the E4's aces alongside a 1010 BST Lugia with 200 BP Dark STAB. It wasn't really approachable without gratuitous amounts of item spamming cheese or surgical over-preparation as your pokemon were fairly vanilla. That said, talking about Dark Rising's use of...pretty much anything...is a rather boring subject as most of the time the answer is "it sucked".


With regard to the more interesting topic of high-stat single-enemy bosses in general: Difficulty can come from many sources, but Pokemon's mechanics work best when the enemies are on the same playing field as the player. Bosses are generally many normal enemy Pokemon against the player's many normal Pokemon- breaking the mold with a singular inflated boss enemy requires careful handling as you either get a comical anti-climax (see BW2's Kyurem battle) or an uninteresting, demoralizing clean wipe if you didn't prepare (see a certain hack's level 70 Kyurem encounter prior to the 4th badge). I don't think making a superboss be fair is impossible, but making it a serious threat to a prepared player while still being interesting and fair against someone with six all-out attackers is unlikely. There's far too many ways to cheese a single enemy in Pokemon, such that taking all the options away would make the game much less interesting- type advantage, Toxic, Paralysis, Destiny Bond, OHKOs, Curse, Perish Song, Leech Seed, Charm/Light Screen, Sand Attack+Recover, Spite, Disable, Encore, Hyper Potion/Revive spam, timely crits/brightpowder/misc. hax...the list goes on. There's also very little reason to switch when there's only one foe, which simplifies things even more.

 

[The Void]

I'm not really fond of that. :( When I play a hack, I do it only for fun and enjoyment, and not any challenge of sorts. For those who'd like it, it'd be really nice if ROM hackers could create a separate version with increased difficulty.

Yeah. Like difficulty patches.

 

[Shhwonk]

I generally am not fond of artificially boosting difficulty for difficulty's sake, but say for a single Pokémon boss battle (eg, legendary), I don't think I would mind if, for example, its Def/Spec Def and HP were increased just to make it more of a tank. And perhaps keeping its Atk/Spec Atk at smaller values. Because in a lot of RPGs, bosses generally are just regular monsters with a hell of a lot of health!

I agree with DoesntKnowHowToPlay^^ that the mechanics in Pokémon hardly allow for much of a boss battle unless it's against a trainer with a full team, because it can result in yourself getting wiped. So I think the boss Pokémon's attacks should balance out its strength-- like, give it more status-ailment-inflicting moves rather than high-powered attacks. Basically just to make it a longer battle. At the same time, that would make it easier to catch without worrying about it fainting...

As for difficulty patches, I've always played the easier patch. I am not a fan of grinding.

 

[machomuu]

Dark Rising only ever boosted legendary stats on the E4, where, in addition to being comically over-leveled like everything else in the hack, you had to deal with 800+ BST legendaries stuck in the middle of full teams- the champ then proceeded to use all of the E4's aces alongside a 1010 BST Lugia with 200 BP Dark STAB. It wasn't really approachable without gratuitous amounts of item spamming cheese or surgical over-preparation as your pokemon were fairly vanilla. That said, talking about Dark Rising's use of...pretty much anything...is a rather boring subject as most of the time the answer is "it sucked".

Ah, thanks for clarifying. So we're talking sharp level curves to create fake difficulty that can only be combated through level grinding or cheating. In that case, yeah, I don't like them. To the point where I don't think they should be included even as difficulty patches, because that's not how you create difficulty and make a game fun. Good game design allows for difficult play without tons upon tons of grinding, and to be truthful, I think any hack that requires grinding without an efficient way to gain experience has succumbed to bad game design, because all it grinding does is bore the player.

With regard to the more interesting topic of high-stat single-enemy bosses in general: Difficulty can come from many sources, but Pokemon's mechanics work best when the enemies are on the same playing field as the player. Bosses are generally many normal enemy Pokemon against the player's many normal Pokemon- breaking the mold with a singular inflated boss enemy requires careful handling as you either get a comical anti-climax (see BW2's Kyurem battle) or an uninteresting, demoralizing clean wipe if you didn't prepare (see a certain hack's level 70 Kyurem encounter prior to the 4th badge). I don't think making a superboss be fair is impossible, but making it a serious threat to a prepared player while still being interesting and fair against someone with six all-out attackers is unlikely. There's far too many ways to cheese a single enemy in Pokemon, such that taking all the options away would make the game much less interesting- type advantage, Toxic, Paralysis, Destiny Bond, OHKOs, Curse, Perish Song, Leech Seed, Charm/Light Screen, Sand Attack+Recover, Spite, Disable, Encore, Hyper Potion/Revive spam, timely crits/brightpowder/misc. hax...the list goes on. There's also very little reason to switch when there's only one foe, which simplifies things even more.

Yeah, there'd have to be a lot of changing to be done. Not just on a stat level, you'd have to restrict the possible moveset and make it so that the boss is self sufficient, to the point that they can take care of themselves without being complete sweepers. And that's kind of the problem. With my hack I'm using a party of individuals gathered throughout the story, so it's not a particularly difficult issue because the types the player has in their disposal and the moves they might have will be fresh in my mind, so I can design the bosses (and the available moves) around that framework.

But with Pokemon, you're right, it's not so simple. And I really think a large part of that stems from the fact that Pokemon is a game where the enemies' Pokemon can be just as strong as the players' (because, in a sense, every pokemon has the potential to be your pokemon). This is why the "mob" enemies exist as wild pokemon, and those pokemon are only weaker due to lack of EVs, lower levels, intentionally lackluster movesets, and the simple AI. Because Pokemon is a game where every pokemon is meant to be caught, and the challenge and difficulty of the games, because of the number of options, is more in the hands of the player than it is the developers (depending on various things).

But I really do wonder if creating a character/Pokemon with high HP/Def/SP Def could make for a real challenge. This is what I had in mind, but I do have my doubts. My hack is very boss-based and, other than my own, I'm a big fan of Pokemon hacks that feature boss battles (which are few, for reasons we've been over) because they allow for a plethora of new avenues in storytelling to be explored. I mean, I would assume that, should the boss be self sufficient in ways where status problems wouldn't be fatal, but could still deal damage (unless that specific boss is immune), somehow maintain his accuracy, possibly be immune to OHKO/Suicidal attacks, and not just not be completely borked by 1-2 takedown strategies, then it could make for a challenging boss, but looking at the list of things that can bork the bosses really makes making a boss seem like a challenge in itself.

...Actually, on that point, would it be possible to implement hidden abilities into Gen 3? Because if it were possible to create a hidden/second ability that had several functions, that might eliminate a few brick walls involved with creating a boss worth a darn..

 

[Le pug]

The lounge browse resources images are great and all and cool you're moving around forums and changing there name, but now you're moving them to the buttons... this is kinda annoying since I use the forums to forum hop yet now I have to click the buttons to go into a specific set of two forums then go back to the front page and look for the new rom hacking titled forum... changing so much in so little time .. don't think the forums moving and leaving only two easily seeable idea was a good idea. just saying

 

[Christos]

The lounge browse resources images are great and all and cool you're moving around forums and changing there name, but now you're moving them to the buttons... this is kinda annoying since I use the forums to forum hop yet now I have to click the buttons to go into a specific set of two forums then go back to the front page and look for the new rom hacking titled forum... changing so much in so little time .. don't think the forums moving and leaving only two easily seeable idea was a good idea. just saying

What do you mean exactly? ROM Hacking moved up as its own category, but you can still easily view all its sections at this link here, which is the link for the category instead of the section. This only makes all of ROM Hacking's sections easier to find from the forums' index.