Pokemon Reborn Hardcore [Mod][Discontinued]

[Paperblade]

On Saturday, February 25, 2017 at 10:39 AM, Lord Chespin said:

Hey! First of all, I love the new sprite you teased. And second, what exactly were the mystery eggs changed to? I got a Swablu in mine, so I assume that all of them were changed...

I got a chatot

[Commander]

So current update since I haven't done one of these in forever. You know it's bad when Ame updates more than you do. Eventing is done for the full release or at least what I need to accomplish. I know there are certain things that I promised that may end up getting pushed into the E17 release. Now before you fret, Reborn is moving very quickly (Ame has gotten past the halfway point) so I don't know how long until the bomb gets dropped onto me and I'd rather not have to release an outdated version of Reborn during that. It's only a few minor things, however, that does give me a few things to sprinkle on you for E17 (as very little is planned beyond E17 as of right now).

 

Now while I could do the alpha testing right now, I'm trying to get the CoM working...again. And more specifically, the weather as for some reason it's err...broken. This thing is really testing my patience. Once that's done, we'll pretty much be good to go after I finish Adrienn's Chamber connection. While it might be in April when I'm able to release it, the worst is over with.

[Commander]

So this is just a little update as well I finally figured out weather. Eventually, I'll work out the system to work with E17's system, but weather should work like the old days for Hardcore. I'll write a note in the Readme, but for right now for those who are new, in order to change the weather to the next week, you need to visit Opal Ward where your game will freeze for a brief moment before being able to move again. The con to this though is that the TV will not display the correct weather and a brief millisecond of lag going in and out of buildings.

 

I also discovered what happened with the money so I have reverted it back to E15 levels of money gaining. Yes, that means some leaders may give a very low amount of Poke, but most opponents should give out a reasonable amount of cash (instead of like 20-30K for random trainers). I won't be checking every trainer so I won't know for sure what the true money gain is, but the ones I have tested such as rematch trainers only gave 3-4 digit amounts.

 

And with that, I will begin Alpha testing soon (ie make sure everything functions properly). After that's all done, I'll have an open beta period (likely just a channel on discord for the sake of simplicity) so that people can find and report errors and mistakes. I'll figure that one out in a week or two.

 

Now I suppose I can throw this little teaser in as I did say I had a few surprises up my sleeve:

 

 

 

 

[Commander]

So just a quick update: I did intend on going through Terra, Ciel, and Adrienn this episode for quality testing as their performances are uhh...lacking for better word. I just finished with Terra and I've made a few adjustments to her team (and gave her new Pokemon some fitting nicknames or I try to because Terra's are...maybe I should ask Marcello to name them or something). So yes, her team is no longer almost a Carbon copy of original Terra (though if you looked below the surface you could see I did a lot of changes to her Pokemon).

 

I suppose I can at least tell you this now: Terra has 3 fights: the original, the true alternate fight, and a doubles fight. I did present it though in a sense that the doubles feels like the alternate fight. This isn't me giving into fans but more like bored me has some free time waiting on stuff and decided to "see just how good Azery's strategy was" which then turned into me merely playing around with a couple ideas. Not how I hoped it'd work, but I'll take it as it passed the test.

 

Ciel in singles format is not going to change that much, but doubles I implemented a few things so I'll think about swapping a mon or two out and see how that goes. I think Gen VII will really help her out but for right now, I'll just have to make do. Then there's Adrienn. I feel Xe's going to win the crown of weakest gym leader. Ciel just got royally screwed as her teams tbh perform pretty well. Adrienn just has very few tools to work with in a field that's a double edged sword...literally. Once that's all done, the beta period will be coming out. This version should technically be really, really solid compared to the mid-release as I'll mostly be looking for typos and such.

 

Oh? You want a vague spoiler pic. Well...sure, why not

 

[Commander]

I revised Ciel's team and well...I may have went a little overboard with the Alternate fight. Not Perma-rain Shelly overboard but uhh...you'll see. Her AI is a little wonky (don't ask me what the programming has against flying types), but she should be threatening still. I did add a Pokemon I didn't originally plan on, but it's role here and the role for the other fight are completely different (and I didn't want to use a certain bird for the umpteenth time). I hope you guys like the new and improved alternate fight, but 5 bucks everyone says she's still too easy. (The singles fight I'm probably going to buff more in E17).

 

All that's really left is E16's fights (ie Victoria, Arclight, ZEL, and Adrienn) but if you thought Ciel had it bad, I think Adrienn is in a worse position. We'll see how Xe performs against the test team (and my Fixing it up test file...if I can ever find it), but E17 is probably where Xe will be buffed up. I'm going to try and make sure the fights aren't a pushover though. Although, I do have an idea that I might use and change Adrienn's Alternate fight next episode.

 

And oh, something just hit me. I know the big thing this release is the alternate fights (during the original CoM it was the level limiter) so out of curiosity, do you guys prefer that over let's say choosing a difficulty at the start of the game?

[Commander]

And after 72 years of waiting, I finally have finished (when Mediafire gets done) with making a fully function version of CoM E16. And as you've all been waiting for, here's the links which will be posted in the OP as well.

 

Mega

Mediafire

 

Discord Channel (DL links are also located here)

 

Here's the changelog:

 

 

-Areas from Post-luna all the way to Adrienn have been implemented and completed

-Removed the random screaming girl event

-Gave Luna's Umbreon a slight Stat Boost

-Added the Randomizer

-Removed Insanity Mode

-"Fixed" the weather system

-Fixed the money spike

-Adjusted the AI levels a little bit to perform slightly better on AoE attacks

-Changed Terra's Roster a little bit

-Changed Adrienn's Roster a little bit

-Gave Ciel's Alternate fight a makeover
 

 

 

The rest of it is all basically new stuff that you've come to expect. Now about the discord channel. You know how everyone is wondering where the heck to you find the download link and page for hardcore. There's just no good place to put it so instead of figuring out which of the two pages of Hardcore is the correct one (the older one will have an out of date version), you can just link the channel and find the current version easily. It's also a way that I can go find and fix bugs easily since Showdown you can lose them over time, but discord I can go back a few days. That's pretty much all I plan on using it for (anyone can PM me if they want a mod dl link available there as well or for any suggestions) so feel free to keep using the Reborn channel to talk about Hardcore.

 

Anything else...oh yeah. There are a few things I said I was going to get done (text editing, Altered Path, and that one thing I can't mention yet), but I haven't forgotten about those. I'm just saving them for later during my downtime. I also can't promise this version will ever go outside of Beta mostly due to E17 looming around the corner. If I get everything I want to done before then, I'll make it official, but no promises. That's enough from me. I'll let you guys enjoy this long overdue mod.

 

Also mini shoutout to Albinoloon for helping me out with a certain sprite that looks amazing. If you don't know who that is, that's a spriter who is helping Zumi out with Xenogene. I didn't forget this time.

[seki108]

36 minutes ago, Commander said:

-Removed the random screaming girl event

I'm not that far into my first playthrough, so if you don't mind me asking, what was this event?

[Commander]

3 minutes ago, seki108 said:

I'm not that far into my first playthrough, so if you don't mind me asking, what was this event?

 

Pretty much it was supposed to be a girl terrified of ghosts running away, but it was so vague it confused people which is why I decided to remove it...I think.

[enu]

8 hours ago, Commander said:

-Areas from Post-luna all the way to Samson have been implemented and completed
 

 

Is this correct? I mean between Luna and Samson there is only the Agate Circus and Route 2. Maybe you meant some other leader than Samson?

 

Also what's the Altered Path if you don't mind me asking?

 

How much work does the Gen 7 mean for you when E17 is out with all the new pokes and alo-forms + Z-moves to be distributed between NPCs? I just hope you won't burn out.

 

Thanks for your hard work!

[Commander]

Just now, baldr said:

 

Is this correct? I mean between Luna and Samson there is only the Agate Circus and Route 2. Maybe you meant some other leader than Samson?

 

Also what's the Altered Path if you don't mind me asking?

 

How much work does the Gen 7 mean for you when E17 is out with all the new pokes and alo-forms + Z-moves to be distributed between NPCs? I just hope you won't burn out.

 

Thanks for your hard work!

 

Fixed it, but I mean Adrienn. The game is done more or less other than minor errors.

 

Altered path is basically...what I want it to be is more of a CoM gauntlet format except in league format. While different opponents would be there, that's not what makes it even more challenging. You cannot edit your Pokemon and possibly even rotate them, but instead of a fixed order, you could challenge them in order based on their tier. Let's say Julia, Florinia, and Shelly are Tier 1. You could face any of them right away. If you beat Julia, you could face Corey next, but if you beat Shelly, you could still only face Shade (ie you could only fight two above the current leader you haven't defeated). I haven't fully fleshed the idea out, but it's a fun challenge best saved for Gen VII as well...a lot of fights need implemented.

 

-First and to put it bluntly, I needed help on this a long while ago for E16. Instead of getting the help I needed, it turned into me during even more work including spriting. The help I did get I am so thankful for. Like, the story of Hardcore in a nutshell all the work getting dumped on me. If this didn't burn me out, I don't think Gen VII will. As for why Gen VII will take a long time, that's my decision and my choice. CoM is mostly excluded from this, but let me get into how quality check goes for Hardcore:

 

For every boss fight (but a huge emphasis on gym leaders): I look at all of my options to pick for a gym leader. For the canon leader (alts are generally not included in this), I look at mons and strategies they used and try to decide what is the most faithful team selection I could go with. Sometimes, I see multiple strategies so I often try to create both. This research comes from both the online league and mons Ame has given them in the past. After that, I design the team in which I go into testing. The first test I do is a damage test. If a Pokemon is not doing enough damage or doesn't serve its role well, it automatically gets replaced (or a stats buff for lategame leaders). After this, I then test to see how well the team can do against a variety of mons so that a single Pokemon cannot easily destroy them by exploiting their weaknesses. If they perform well enough, they pass. I also have to take the field gimmicks into consideration so often I have to read up on those as well when deciding or to pick. It really helps in picking Pokemon that are meant to surprise and throw players off (such as the early game Heliolisk).

 

Admittedly, Gen VII shouldn't be too difficult to transition to, but the hard part is retesting all of those trainer fights (Random NPCs should take no more than an hour to transition to the new gen). I could see me just adding extra mons to the trainers instead of just replacing them since the level limiter is a thing. It'll take time, but I like team designing so it'll be very enjoyable even if it takes a long time. What would really help me and speed development up a lot is for the above checks to be done with the CoM Gauntlet. You can tell which fights I've done it on and which ones I haven't put as much effort. On the bright side, E17 of Hardcore will add very little to the table in terms of new content and be all about focusing on battles. All 6,000 Plus lines of battles.

 

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Oh and about the PBS files since Reborn publicly released them. I'll do the same for the Hardcore files after a month has passed. My only rule is that you can't use them to make a hard mode mod (as well you'd be using my work and claiming it as your own), but other than that, yes, you are allowed to use it.

[enu]

2 hours ago, Commander said:

(Random NPCs should take no more than an hour to transition to the new gen)

 

Based on some feedback other people gave on Patreon Ame might end up redoing most if not all the Meteor Grunts. With more focus on their pokemon variety, which grunts work for which Meteor Admin, to have each grunt keep his teams across multiple encounters, keeping their pairings for double battles and so on. I can't be sure if this will relly happen but if it does it might mean some more work for you (if you choose to preserve these concepts).

 

2 hours ago, Commander said:

What would really help me and speed development up a lot is for the above checks to be done with the CoM Gauntlet. You can tell which fights I've done it on and which ones I haven't put as much effort.

 

I don't quite follow what you mean here. You previously said you'll postpone the CoM Gauntlet until E18 I think? I have not finished Hardcore yet so I don't quite know what the Gauntlet thing even is and how it differs from regular CoM. Don't understand how this would help you and whether it's something other people can help you with. You don't have to explain though. I'll probably catch up once I play through the CoM and the Gauntlet.

Edited March 27, 2017 by baldr

[Commander]

8 hours ago, baldr said:

 

Based on some feedback other people gave on Patreon Ame might end up redoing most if not all the Meteor Grunts. With more focus on their pokemon variety, which grunts work for which Meteor Admin, to have each grunt keep his teams across multiple encounters, keeping their pairings for double battles and so on. I can't be sure if this will relly happen but if it does it might mean some more work for you (if you choose to preserve these concepts).

 

 

I don't quite follow what you mean here. You previously said you'll postpone the CoM Gauntlet until E18 I think? I have not finished Hardcore yet so I don't quite know what the Gauntlet thing even is and how it differs from regular CoM. Don't understand how this would help you and whether it's something other people can help you with. You don't have to explain though. I'll probably catch up once I play through the CoM and the Gauntlet.

 

If you really want to know how trainers will work, I will have both PBS trainer files open, scroll down both of them at the same time and transfer and change Pokemon by copy and pasting. Levels will be easy as well as I generally just add five levels. If Meteor grunt teamso change, I may just do a mix of old and new or maybe just new mons. Easier than fixing it in this version as both trainer classes and trainer names were changed for a lot of trainers. That took 20 minutes to fix and figure out. If that gets screwed up, the game is unplayable compared to having the wrong Pokemon. Not a big deal and a days worth of work at the most. 

 

As for the CoM, I figured a good compromise. Like in the original releases, I am going to release this in segments. E17 is going to be everything you see here, but with E17 areas added on. That is the first release. Then I will go back and edit all of the bosses one by one and give releases for updated chunks of the game like first release will be a gen VIi update up until Shade.

 

As for the actual gauntlet, there is a mode which I refer to as classic mode. This itself is playable through the whole thing, but it is not what I would call completed in my eyes. Hell, I may even get that done before E17 is released and have no need to push it back until E18. 

 

I only need two things for help on. Someone to help design and quality check CoM fights, but I can get that done over time. I also need someone to make an interesting overworld graphic. While it is not needed, it would make for some very nice polishing. Only hint I will give on that is think about the trading card game.

[Dreamy]

Hooray! Now that theres a "full" release for E16, I'll probably start playing this in my midterm break in a couple weeks. I look forward to it greatly

[seki108]

I don't want to ask about every little thing, but it's been 3 hours, so I'm going to ask.  How do you get past the officer blocking the Onyx ward, telling you to go to Hardcore HQ while they search a crime scene?  Nothing unique happens when I enter the building or talk to the scientist.  I started the 'party' system after saving Obsidia (but before talking to the officer) and have found silent Fern while searching for how to proceed.   

[Commander]

24 minutes ago, seki108 said:

I don't want to ask about every little thing, but it's been 3 hours, so I'm going to ask.  How do you get past the officer blocking the Onyx ward, telling you to go to Hardcore HQ while they search a crime scene?  Nothing unique happens when I enter the building or talk to the scientist.  I started the 'party' system after saving Obsidia (but before talking to the officer) and have found silent Fern while searching for how to proceed.   

 

Did you try talking to the service desk lady? If she's not there...I know what I did wrong.

 

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Just a little update: there were two glitches discovered in the beta which I added the map files with fixes on them. Just download and replace them in the data folder. Trust me, they only take a second to download compared to taking down and reuploading (which I'll do when everything is going to work fine).

 

Edit: And I found a third. This one is kind of bad compared to the others. I'm going to wait until either this saturday or next saturday and reupload the game with these fixes and hopefully fix some typos.

[seki108]

11 minutes ago, Commander said:

Did you try talking to the service desk lady? If she's not there...I know what I did wrong.

 

She isn't.  The inside only has these two NPC's:

Spoiler

 

[Commander]

2 minutes ago, seki108 said:

She isn't.  The inside only has these two NPC's:

  Reveal hidden contents

 

 

I noticed the reason behind the problem so I reuploaded the data for the map causing the glitch (look in the OP and it should be there). Just download that single file and drag and move that file into the data folder of where your game is and overwrite the old file.

 

In a week or so, I'll take down and reupload the entire game with these fixes installed, but for the sake of not spending an hour and you having to download it again for 20 or so minutes, I try to upload these when possible. Please report if you are having trouble and don't be afraid to ask. (Also you can transfer your save to Reborn to progress worse comes to worse).

[seki108]

9 minutes ago, Commander said:

Please report if you are having trouble and don't be afraid to ask. (Also you can transfer your save to Reborn to progress worse comes to worse).

Everything is working fine now.  Thank you for your quick response.   I'm glad it wasn't a case of me overlooking something obvious.

Edited March 29, 2017 by seki108

[enu]

I've finally started my first Hardcore playthrough. Would you like me to give you some feedback on the Gym battles as I play through them? (I play with Battle Style set and No-Items challenge enabled.)

[Commander]

17 hours ago, baldr said:

I've finally started my first Hardcore playthrough. Would you like me to give you some feedback on the Gym battles as I play through them? (I play with Battle Style set and No-Items challenge enabled.)

 

If you want to go for it, but uhh E17 is going to be kind of weird. A lot of leaders are going to be reviewed and some of them are going to get team swaps. There's roughly 100 bosses when I get through everything so not all of them are going to be good at the start and opinions vary. I do appreciate feedback, but I just want to make sure you know that I tend to use it for awareness, not for solutions. 

[Dreamy]

Is the feature list in the OP updated for the current version?

Also just one week til I can start this =)

[aspectoflife]

Thanks for doing this, I've been enjoying the extra story put into this, your take on the lore behind the hardcore league was really enjoyable.

Extra details such as changing growlithe to arcanine in the story text was really appreciated too.

Boss fights are really challenging, all gym battles I experienced was harrowing, it always comes to the last mon standing, granted I only have 2 but still.

Item ban and level limiter was also a quality of life improvement for me.

 

Just wondering if you have the gen 7 PBS files ready? Wanted to get my hands on the new gen 7 pokemon.

Nvm, just red that you'll release it in a month, my bad.

Edited April 2, 2017 by aspectoflife

[enu]

3 hours ago, aspectoflife said:

Just wondering if you have the gen 7 PBS files ready? Wanted to get my hands on the new gen 7 pokemon.

Nvm, just red that you'll release it in a month, my bad.

 

Those PBS files Commander said he will release will not contain Gen 7. You'll have to wait for Ame to release Reborn E17.

[aspectoflife]

15 hours ago, baldr said:

 

Those PBS files Commander said he will release will not contain Gen 7. You'll have to wait for Ame to release Reborn E17.

Ah, I see, thanks for the heads up, probably just gonna have to edit it myself then.

[enu]

On 30. 3. 2017 at 9:11 PM, Commander said:

 

If you want to go for it, but uhh E17 is going to be kind of weird. A lot of leaders are going to be reviewed and some of them are going to get team swaps. There's roughly 100 bosses when I get through everything so not all of them are going to be good at the start and opinions vary. I do appreciate feedback, but I just want to make sure you know that I tend to use it for awareness, not for solutions. 

 

Oh that's absolutely fine! I don't expect you to change anything right now based on my feedback since Gen 7 will be out soon (well except AI bugs perhaps). And of course you can't fix everything, there will always be some waeknesses. You might the feedback later when redesigning the teams with Gen 7 in mind. I'm making videos of the Gym battles if you want to see the issues for yourself.

 

Julia

Battle-style: Set

Challenge: No-Items

Team: Singles

Result: Defeated Julia on first try.

Issues:

• I had my Linoone use Mud Sport right away to destroy her field. Maybe some of her pokemon could have Electric Terrain to renew it?
• After my Roselia defeated one of her pokes, Julia sent out her Chinchou which was of course powerless against Roselia. (She had Chinchou, Heliolisk and Electrode left.)
• Heliolisk was a disappointment. It kept using Parabolic Charge against Roselia for minimal damage while Roselia overhealed herself easily with Mega Drain. I don't know if it has something better - either it doesn't or the AI messed up. I'd recommend a Hidden Power (Ice) maybe?
• I think her team could be stronger by one or two levels, closer to the cap. Most of her mons are lvl17 and I of course had everyone at level 20. With the level limiter you can easily expect the player to reach the cap (and maybe have some NPC explicitly tell the player that it's expected).

 

Florinia

Battle-style: Set

Challenge: No-Items

Team: Singles

Result: She defeated me several times, forcing me to train a Fearow to deal with her Breloom.

Notes:

• The Breloom is a real threat considering the player has very limited access to pokemon who can outspeed it at this point. I really liked it.
• I noticed that even with the level limiter Rare Candy can be used to bypass it. Not sure if it's intended but I used this to evolve my Gulpin to Swalot right before Florinia (evolves at 26, Florinia's limit is 25) and used a Common Candy to fix the level back to 25.

Issues:

• I think she should have switched out her Breloom against my Fearow.
• I had Swalot use Toxic on her Cradily to poison it. Cradily than used Giga Drain (not very effective) against my Swalot several times and rarely switched to Rock Slide (normally effective). This is clearly an AI bug - using ineffective move and trying to prolong the battle while badly poisoned.

 

Also and Johnathan said that this is still kiddies league. Where do I sign up for the adult league? :-P

Edited April 8, 2017 by baldr