Little Corrections Topic

[Zenith]

Wait, Riptide? *looks at Topaz move list* Why do Dragon Gale and Riptide have base power? Phazes aren't supposed to do damage! That's overpowered by itself!

And why would Speed matter with Riptide, anyway? Phazes always go last.

I can't just bold changes to the movelist...I did more than just replace moves...

[ImmunityBow]

I know phazes aren't supposed to do damage. That's why they were given very limited access, kind of like Tale Glow. Speed does matter, considering that Dolphure outspeeds basically every other phazer who would be trying to phaze it out (aside from, say Groudon), and when it's not trying to phaze Speed + Tail Glow can get over the top. Just bold whatever you can, added moves, changed levels. If you want to be extra special say what you took out at the end.

[Zenith]

I think the bigger problem there is how Riptide & Dragon Gale do decent damage in addition to being pretty accurate phazes, not the fact that Tail Glow is also available. We can't really keep every 'Mon that has one of the two from getting anything that boosts Sp. Attack, as that would really limit them. If we dropped the BP to ~30 and lowered the accuracy to 80-85 they would be less overpowered.

Okay, the moveset changes for the Echoise line. Added moves are bold-italicized; moves with their levels shifted have their level numbers bold-italicized. Dropped moves are mentioned after each list.

Echoise
-----------------
-- Tackle
-- Tail Whip
07 Water Gun
11 Supersonic
14 Water Sport (moved from 15) (lol, wrote Water Gun a second time here on my other post)
18 Water Pulse
21 Soothe Song (moved from 22)
24 Cascade (moved from 29)
28 Windwhistle
32 Take Down
36 Serenade (moved from 37)
39 Purify (originally exclusive to Dolphure)
43 Hydro Pump (moved from 50)
48 Water Wall (moved from 42)

Removed:
-Bubblebeam (too similar to Water Pulse and Cascade under normal circumstances)
-Whirlpool (too many Water moves; why trap when you have high Sp. Atk and STAB Surf?)
-Dive (is an HM in game; elaborated on in an earlier post)


Mermeidon
-----------------
-- Tackle
-- Tail Whip
-- Water Gun
-- Shine (added for aesthetic reasons--showing its increasing control over light)
07 Water Gun (moved from --; the canon games do this for moves that aren't form-exclusive)
11 Supersonic (moved from --)
14 Water Sport (moved from --)
18 Water Pulse (moved from 16)
22 Soothe Song (moved from 23)
26 Light Wave (originally exclusive to Dolphure)
32 Windwhistle
35 Take Down
40 Serenade (moved from 39)
43 Purify (originally exclusive to Dolphure)
48 Hydro Pump (moved from 52)
53 Water Wall (moved from 44)

Removed:
-Bubblebeam (see Echoise)
-Cascade (redundant to a lesser extent, replaced by Light Wave on Mermeidon and Dolphure)
-Whirlpool (see Echoise)
-Dive (see Echoise)

Dolphure
-----------------
-- Tackle
-- Tail Whip
-- Water Gun
-- Shine (see Mermeidon)
07 Water Gun (moved from --)
11 Supersonic (also moved from --)
14 Water Sport ( " " --)
18 Water Pulse ( " " --)
22 Soothe Song (...We need a Ditto emote...)
26 Light Wave (moved from 32)
32 Windwhistle
36 Signal Beam
42 Serenade (moved from 44)
46 Purify (moved from 35)
52 Hydro Pump (moved from 58)
58 Tail Glow

Removed:
-Bubblebeam (see Echoise)
-Cascade (see Mermeidon)
-Whirlpool (see Echoise)
-Water Wall (still on Echoise and Mermeidon)
-Dive (see Echoise)

[ImmunityBow]

I think you're taking the concept of "limiting a Pokemon" too hard.

Limiting a Pokemon is GOOD. There are many, many cases where it'd be better to limit a Pokemon and many, many fewer cases where you wouldn't want a Pokemon to be able to access everything in its archetype. Dolphure gets Riptide, unlike the other bulky waters out there, thus, it doesn't get a good boosting move. It's not a bad thing, it's letting one Pokemon not do absolutely everything. There are also very few Pokemon who get Riptide or Dragon Gale, so the number of Pokemon limited is rather low.

Water Wall over Tail Glow, everything else is fine.

[Zenith]

The main reason I put Tail Glow on there was to make Dolphure an effective Special sweeper. I really wanted to take advantage of the high SpA & Spd...all four canon Water starters have below average or worse speed, and I wanted to give Dolphure the option to be a fast sweeper in contrast. Water Wall as the last move on a starter's final form doesn't really have a sense of finality. Furthermore, building a starter's moveset almost completely around support basically dooms them to being pretty bad in game.

If you take out Tail Glow, would Wrath work in its place? Dolphure would be able to take greater advantage of dual STAB even without doubling its SpA, and it would have the option of being a good tank (along the lines of Swampert) instead of always having to run support in PvP.

[ImmunityBow]

Wrath just doesn't make sense. Tail Glow wouldn't make Dolphure an effective special sweeper, it would put it over the top. You've already given it a strong improvement with Signal Beam, but giving Dolphure Tail Glow is basically just building its moveset for the player (Tail Glow, Ice Beam, Surf/Riptide, Signal Beam).

[Zenith]

Not exactly. For one, Riptide is a breeding move, which means most people won't bother getting it until postgame. Even if someone did bother to breed their starter during the game, phazes are basically useless in game (outside of the canon games' Battle Frontier, on a team that's built on residual damage), since you get the chance to switch out when you knock out an opponent's 'mon. Most importantly, you won't be seeing those moves together. Sweeper builds wouldn't be using Riptide...why make them switch, taking damage and not doing much yourself, when you can take most out with Surf or a different move in two turns, and only take one hit anyway? What about 'mons that Dolphure is weak to? Wouldn't it make more sense to switch out, since trying to phaze will make Dolphure take a SE hit anyway? Not even Dolphure's defenses could stop a 2HKO. And wall builds would be using something more along the line of Surf/Riptide/Toxic/Protect.

Tail Glow would improve its sweeping ability (and hey, Swords Dance isn't exactly rare), while Wrath would give it another move option, making Dolphure harder to predict, and taking away sweeping ability for a secondary STAB to help tank with.

I still think the bigger problem here is Riptide/DG actually having decent base power and still being pretty accurate.

[neon.Barnacle]

Going off on a tangent, but seeing as how Riptide and other similar moves are straight upgrades to Roar/Whirlwind, why don't we give it a negative effect? Like, for example, the user must go second the next turn.

[ImmunityBow]

The negative effect is the accuracy decrease, which can be made more severe if necessary.

Zenith, either you talk about ingame, or competitive, not both. Currently I'm talking competitive, where things will be happening oftentimes like this:

OPPONENT switched in MALLARGE
DOLPHURE used TAIL GLOW
DOLPHURE used RIPTIDE
OPPONENT switched in RANDOM POKEMON X
DOLPHURE proceeded to sweep every Pokemon on the team, since the only phazer (Mallarge) was slower and couldn't Roar it out.

Swords Dance isn't rare but there was a very good reason for why Nasty Plot only appeared in hyper-offensive D/P: before D/P generally special moves had BP 95, Physical moves around 80. That's why Earthquake was so overused, besides the awesome Ground typing.

And there are enough mindgames for Dolphure as is. We really, really don't need yet another Gengar. Giving options is an unacceptable reason to be changing a moveset. Dolphure has an EXCELLENT movepool with tons of options that no Water-type has had before. It has the speed and special attack to hurt things with Surf/Ice Beam/Signal Beam when necessary, and tanky stats to use its vast and unique support movepool. There is really no need to improve or worsen Dolphure at all.

[Zenith]

Hm. That is a problem. Barring accuracy hax, you would probably lose a couple 'mons before you took that out.

But the fact that Riptide is overpowered is still the bigger issue here. Riptide/DG have decent base power while still being phazes, and the slightly reduced accuracy isn't enough of a drawback. And doesn't the fact that we're handicapping the Echoise line's movepool (no Sp. Atk booster, no powerful secondary STAB as an alternate option) just because it has Riptide as an egg move say something about how overpowered it is? Are we gonna have to do that with everything that gets Riptide or Dragon Gale?

And something else no one has brought up: the Echoise line also has Agility as an egg move. If Dolphure with Riptide is bad even without Tail Glow, what would happen when not even Ninjask can catch it?

Going off on a tangent, but seeing as how Riptide and other similar moves are straight upgrades to Roar/Whirlwind, why don't we give it a negative effect? Like, for example, the user must go second the next turn.

That's one option. But if the player just uses Riptide again, Dolphure will already go last. We could just de-power it a little: 30 BP, 75% Accuracy?

[ImmunityBow]

You know, there is lots of precedent of moves in Pokemon being strictly better than others. Tail Glow vs. Growth, Haze vs. Defog, Flamethrower vs. Ember. It's not exactly a problem that Riptide is better than Roar/Whirlwind, especially since its general use is defensive to help counteract the offensiveness of the physical/special split and generally higher base powered Topaz moves. It's just when it's paired with strong boosting sweepers that it's a problem. And how many Pokemon had Tail Glow before D/P's Nasty Plot? Two, maybe, yet special sweepers were such a force that Blissey or Snorlax were on every team, and Blissey is so minimaxed towards special sponging it's actually ridiculous. There are plenty of special sweepers who long only had one usable STAB: Zapdos, Sceptile, Gengar (no usable STAB before D/P!), Jolteon, etc. Last time I checked none of those could boost their SAtk either, even after D/P.

Also, Agility isn't nearly as degenerate as Tail Glow. Agility won't help you sweep through teams without a ridiculously high base Atk/SAtk stat (Metagross), and Dolphure's damage isn't that great without it. However, Dolphure's SAtk IS good enough reactively, to help hurt problematic Dragons and such.

[Zenith]

The difference between Riptide/DG and the other phazes isn't like the difference between Flamethrower and Ember. The other phazes are already good in their own right. They aren't intentionally underpowered like Ember is. They're more like if a new Fire move was made that had 130 BP, 100% Accuracy, and no negative effects, or was like Flamethrower, but also always increased the user's Sp. Attack. It may be a stronger counterpart to an existing move, but it's still too overpowered.

Jolteon has Charge Beam, which boosts its Sp. Atk 1 stage half the time. Gengar has Levitate, 130 SpA, 110 Spd, and insane type coverage...so many good things, a lack of a SpA boost doesn't matter. And most importantly, 4th Gen introduced Life Orb and Choice Specs, which can equipped on anything, and won't be in Topaz.

Well, okay, at this point I understand Tail Glow. But what about putting Wrath in instead? Dolphure wouldn't be able to sweep as well, but would be more geared toward tanking, thanks to dual STAB. It would probably end up similar to Swampert, with Protect, Riptide, and two attacking moves, with the difference of having better Speed, but no physical options and no ability to set up entry hazards. And it would be kept from being too strong because it can't effectively cover every base with only four moves (like why Gallade is only BL).

(This is one of those cases where that edited Aurora Beam would really help...)

[ImmunityBow]

I'm perfectly fine reducing Riptide's accuracy to 80%, or damage to 20 BP (Rapid Spin and Knock-Off-style).

Gengar was amazing before 4th gen, for the exact same reasons as Dolphure, really. It had ONE good Sp. Atk move (Thunderbolt, not even STAB) but a great range of support moves. Dolphure, on the other hand, has STAB Surf, Ice Beam, and Signal Beam, which are all great moves in their own right. Bring Dolphure down to 33% and Surf gains an additional STAB, and with Dolphure's speed and defenses it can certainly Petaya sweep (not that this generally is a great strategy but it might be one of the ones that can) or even Salac sweep. Jolteon, too, was amazing before D/P, with one STAB move (Thunderbolt as well) and also a decent support movepool. Charge Beam takes four turns (4!!) on average before it starts to outperform Thunderbolt, damage-wise. But yes, enough about Tail Glow.

Wrath just doesn't click with Dolphure's nature and looks. I really don't see it using Wrath. In any case, I don't think it will use it even if it had it. It would only really want to hit Ghost-types with it, which are relatively few and far between and often get hit nearly as hard by STAB Hydro Pump and harder with Torrent. Dolphure would be far more concerned with running Signal Beam to deal with troublesome Grass and Psychic types. Take, for example, Starmie, (who also has a good support movepool, speed, defenses, and Water-typing), who runs Ice Beam and Thunderbolt, and generally Surf but not Psychic since it already deals with most of what would be covered by Psychic or would still switch out regardless.

[Zenith]

Yeah, something like 20 BP/90% Acc or 25 BP/80% Acc would work. The biggest problem with Riptide and Dragon Gale is that they're too strong for what they do.

Yeah, I can see what you mean about Wrath. But we still need something there for Dolphure. It doesn't really make a lot of sense for something with a more offensive-based moveset to get a support move as its last one. I geared Echoise and Mermeidon's movesets more toward support to begin with, so it fit better with them. Dolphure needs something with more of a sense of finality. Any ideas for something like that?

About Jolteon: Charge Beam sets also have Thunderbolt.

And something I just thought of. Apparently, 5th Gen is changing Growth to increase both Atk and SpA, and Sturdy will work like a Focus Sash. Any plans on incorporating either of these in Topaz?

[ImmunityBow]

Isn't being able to summon a wall of water pretty epic?

The 5th gen changes are interesting. Nothing has boosted both offensive stats before, and Sturdy is pretty bad as is. What does everyone else think?

[NyteFyre]

Main reason I haven't posted in here for a while is I have almost no clue what either of you have been talking about, so I felt really left out. I hear 5th gen is going to make up for the near atrocity that was 4th gen. I like the idea of both Offensive stats being boosted, but what about both defensive stats? Also, I didn't know what Sturdy did before hand, so I don't know...Any chance either of you could teach me? Via Pm of course. Don't want to take up perfectly good space.

Also, personally, I think that each starter line should get it's own unique move, that actually works well for that line, instead of the crap that is Hydro Cannon, Frenzy Plant, etc... which they just to every starter. That way, the final forms could have a good finale move, that won't over kill them too much, yet still work well.

[ImmunityBow]

Cosmic Power does both defensive stats. As well as Stockpile, now. Sturdy prevents one-hit-KO moves like Guillotine, Fissure and Sheer Cold, which was pretty useless competitively.

[NyteFyre]

Oh, ok, thanks. I never understood why they made those moves to begin with.

[totodileman]

probably for the non competetive people, or for pokemon with the abilty that makes everything 100% hit, both you and opponent (cant remember what though. that would be a devestating thing for the non speedy teams.)

[SilentSentinel]

I would support the 5th gen changes to Sturdy and Growth. I don't really think that the final move on a starter set needs to be super powerful though. Things like Torterra end with Leaf Storm, which is powerful but sucks on the pokemon. I'd rather have an actually usable support move than a crappy damage move.

[Zenith]

Meh. It still seems anticlimactic. I guess we can go back to it later if something comes up.

I'm all for the 5th Gen changes, especially the Sturdy one. Aggron would actually be able to take an Earthquake.

Keeping with the starter discussion: As of right now, Kelvoyant doesn't have a levelup moveset listed. Fahramane learns Soul Burn at Level 18. Soul Burn is basically a Fire version of Giga Drain. In 4th Gen, the earliest Giga Drain is learned by anyone is 25 (Roselia), and the average (taken from the strongest form of each line that learns it) is 41.1. tl;dr: Level 18 is too early.

[ImmunityBow]

Whoops, fixed, Kelvoyant's list is up.

[Zenith]

My take on an edit to the Celsinge line's moveset. As IB requested, I won't be adding very many new moves, and I only took a couple away, for reasons I explained. Some will be limited to certain forms.

There'll be comments at the end for explaining stuff.

Celsinge
------------------
-- Scratch
-- Growl
07 Ember
11 Fury Swipes
15 Bite (1)
18 Roar
22 Flame Wheel
26 Will-O-Wisp
30 Slash
34 Soul Burn
37 Flamethrower
42 Slack Off
47 Burnout
52 Fire Blast

Fahramane
------------------
-- Scratch
-- Growl
-- Ember
-- Bite
07 Ember
11 Fury Swipes
14 Bite (1)
19 Roar
23 Flame Wheel
27 Will-O-Wisp
31 Slash
35 Soul Burn
39 Flamethrower
44 Slack Off
50 Burnout
56 Fire Blast

Kelvoyant
------------------
-- Scratch
-- Growl
-- Ember
-- Confusion (2)
07 Ember
11 Fury Swipes
14 Bite
19 Roar
23 Flame Wheel
27 Will-O-Wisp
31 Slash
32 Psybeam (3)
36 Soul Burn
41 Flamethrower
46 Psychic
52 Inferno
59 Mystic Power (4)

(Removed: Rest, Yawn) (5)

1. I switched Bite and Fury Swipes for two reasons. For one, I didn't want to give Celsinge a another 60 BP move (to go with STAB Ember) too early. For two, it made a little more aesthetic sense for the evolution to Fahramane to emphasize a stronger bite.
2. Just an aesthetic change. After all, it makes sense for Kelvoyant and its natural "mind over matter" personality to have a mental-based secondary STAB than a physical attack that isn't STAB.
3. Obligatory move learned right when reaching 3rd form. I felt like Psychic was too overpowered to give out at 32, especially when I hadn't made Flamethrower or Soul Burn available yet.
4. I swear, this isn't supposed to be like my original plan for Dolphure. I needed a balance between offensive and support moves, and between Fire and Psychic ones. It just kind of ended up that way.
5. I didn't want to have to take out moves, but there were just too many to work with. Kelvoyant's learns its final move at Level 68 in the old list, a full ten levels later than the other starters, despite never going more than five levels before learning a new one. I took out Rest because it didn't really fit well, and because it's a TM anyway. Yawn was a little harder...basically, it came down to Yawn and Roar, and Roar fit better. Fortunately, the Ground egg group is ginormous, so there's no way something in that group doesn't have Yawn.

Also, is there any reason why Kelvoyant isn't also in the Humanoid group?

[ImmunityBow]

Yawn is pretty important, considering that it's very, very typical of lions (not that Roar isn't even more so). Moving it to Egg Group is acceptable, I guess, there are Ground Yawners (Eevee, for example).

Yeah, so this seems fine to me, your changes are well explained. I wish we could have kept Yawn and Rest in somehow, since they are really lion-style moves, but I understand that something had to go.

Actually, part of the reason I don't want Tail Glow as a last move on Dolphure is because it would mirror Kelvoyant's Mystic Power too well.

[Zenith]

Okay, I need to know, are we 100% on going with 5th Gen's version of Growth? I'll probably end up doing an edit of the Venap line's moveset some time this week, and how late Growth will be learned will depend on whether we go with the old or new version.

[SilentSentinel]

I support using 5th gens growth mechanic.

[NyteFyre]

agreed, 5th gen mechanic of Growth.

[SilentSentinel]

Now that damaging phaze moves are canon (Dragon Tail, which is actually even more powerful than Dragon Gale and Riptide), I think we should leave ours as they were.

[Zenith]

We don't have Specs or Life Orb to boost the damage from opponents up against Riptide/DG. And Dragon Tail & Overhead Throw are looking pretty overpowered in the first place. Why boost ours back to near their level when Topaz's metagame is less equipped to deal with them?

Another thing I literally just thought of: since they do damage, Taunt won't stop them.

[ImmunityBow]

That's good, hyperspeed taunt leads needed to be taken down a notch anyway.

[Zenith]

It makes me worried about how overly Stall-based it could get, with noticeably fewer offensive options and 'Mons with phazes that aren't Tauntable, and therefore can't be set up on or countered at all. And if their stats are good...well, remember how much I had to limit Dolphure?

[ImmunityBow]

Dolphure was limited by not getting Tail Glow or Wrath. Like 99% of other Pokemon, may I add. That's not really that limiting. I have nothing to worry about Stall dominating, with offensive powerhouses like Kunaiga running amok.

[Zenith]

More possible 5th Gen move changes:
-Giga Drain: 60 BP->75 BP
Since we don't seem to have any Technician users in the C-K Dex, all it would do is make it a little more viable in general.
-Thrash: 80 BP->120 BP
-Petal Dance: 90 BP->120 BP
-Temper: 85 BP->120 BP
A BP boost means these could actually be kind of worth using, despite getting locked in and stuff.

[ImmunityBow]

Giga Drain was already viable, though 75 BP wouldn't hurt.

I'm definitely not sold on bumping Temper to 85, we're actually probably not even going to bump Outrage all the way up to 120 either. 85 does seem low but 120 proved itself ridiculous in 4th gen.

[totodileman]

I think we should do this

[Zenith]

Well, Outrage is ridiculous because of its incredible neutral coverage. I'd actually be in favor of lowering Outrage's BP to 100 and putting the others at 120.

The whole point of the BP boost is to give people a reason to use them. Why use the old Petal Dance when Seed Bomb/Cherry Bomb is only a little weaker and doesn't have all of the downsides?

[ImmunityBow]

Still, not 120 BP. 100 is fine, but it's been proven that the drawback isn't always as much of a problem as once thought. I didn't say that I wasn't in favour of any changes at all, but a couple of caveats:
1. Not 120 BP, 120 BP should have direct, powerful drawbacks that seriously make you reconsider using it again the next turn, or require some setup. I know we just gave Solar Cell to Solarbeam but having 8 PP, 4 against Pressure, and not working during non Sun/regular weather and taking an item slot all kind of work together to make it happen.
2. Not everything at 100 BP. I don`t care about `fair`, the game is far better when there is variance in power between similar moves of different types.

I`m also not sold on Hi Jump Kick`s power boost

[Zenith]

I'm not that sold on HJK's ginormous boost myself...if it was 100, fine, but...

The thing is, those moves have drawbacks. Once you're locked in, all an opponent has to do is switch in something that resists it. You're stuck either doing negligible damage while your opponent sets up, or switching yourself and risk letting the opponent set up.

Furthermore, some of them need that boost to be viable in the first place. With them so low, there are multiple alternatives that are more worth using. Why use a 90 BP Petal Dance when you can use a 95 BP Floral Storm that doesn't lock you in? Why use a 90 BP Outrage when you have an 80 BP Dragon Claw with no drawbacks? It's especially bad with Temper because it's Physical Fire's only option.

[SilentSentinel]

That comment about Temper is the big one for me. They do have drawbacks by being able to switch to something that resists, but 120 is still pretty damn high. Putting them at 90 makes most of them useless though, especially with Floral storm, return, and dragon claw around.

If I had to make them different, I'd put Outrage and Thrash at 95-100, Petal Dance and Temper at 105-110. Thrash will lose to Return even with 110BP, and Outrage has great neutral coverage. Petal Dance will still have to compete with the TM of Floral Storm for a spot, but Temper is it unless you go down to Fire Punch, and those two moves have lots of types that resist them.

[ImmunityBow]

Fire Punch was more than usable during DPPt, even more so than Flare Blitz in many cases. As I said before, I agree that Temper at 85 is too low, but Fire isn`t exactly doomed if it doesn`t have a 120 BP move to abuse. Factor in that most physical walls are weak to fire, and so you can`t switch in Skarmory or Forretress (and I guess Bronzong) as you could with non-Garchomp Outrage.