Are Common/Reverse Candies a good game mechanic?

[Zargerth]

These little sweets aren't limited to one fan-game, so that's why I post this topic here. My examples will mostly be of Reborn and Rejuvenation, though.

 

I understand that it's handy to have something that decreases your Pokemons level, should you over-level it past your current level cap. However, depending on your point of view there's a drawback to this - Common Candies take away the emphasis of managing your EXP early on. There's no need to worry about it all: your Charmeleon leveled up to lvl 26 before Florinia? Just use a Common Candy or two. In my opinion especially in the early game there's an abundance of EXP and the level cap is easy to reach without (much) grinding. The fact that Common Candies make managing your EXP less of an issue can be either a good or bad thing. 

 

That's not all there is to them, though. I don't know if it was intended, but with Common Candies you can have "illegal" mons in the sense that they're lower level than what they actually should be. You can evolve your Charmeleon to Charizard, then bring it back to level 35 before battling Shelly, for example. I'm guilty of doing this myself, so I'm not actually judging anybody. One level may not seem that bad to you, but what if I used over 20 Reverse Candies? I can now have one or more level 1 Donphans with Sturdy- ability that know both Endeavor and Ice Shard. They're basically F.E.A.R with Focus Sashes of their own. There's a reason why Berry Juices were removed from vendors in Gearen City...

 

In my experience later on lowering your levels becomes rather irrelevant, I find myself more often under-leveled (my team is several levels lower than the Gym Leaders) than over-leveled. Grinding also becomes more relevant, especially if you wanted to train a new mon or two. Sometimes I feel like the availability or Common/Reverse and Rare Candies should be, well, reversed: by making Reverse or Common Candies more rare there's more emphasis on managing your EXP, as well as by making Rare Candies more common grinding and leveling up becomes easy and less time-consuming. You still can't level up past the level cap, unless you prefer battling with over-leveled mons who don't obey you.

 

What are your thoughts on Reverse and Common Candies? Are they fine the way they're now, or should something be changed?

 

TL;DR: Reverse/Common Candies make managing your EXP pretty much a non-issue, and also allow you to use low-level fully evolved mons.

[Wolfox]

I see your point. however, I also take into consideration that there are people who don't know about the level cap and easily hit it regardless of grinding. The candies are a safety net so you can keep using the mons you wanna use without having to switch it out for something else once it hits the cap

[Zargerth]

7 minutes ago, Wolfox said:

I see your point. however, I also take into consideration that there are people who don't know about the level cap and easily hit it regardless of grinding. The candies are a safety net so you can keep using the mons you wanna use without having to switch it out for something else once it hits the cap

This is a fair point. I'd like to point out, however, that if you take some time and get acquainted with Reborns (or whatever fan-game you're playing) mechanics, you should be able to find out about the level caps. I also question whether you need an endless supply of Reverse Candies as a safety net. What I liked about the Hardcore Mod was that it gave you both Exp. Share and Lucky Egg right off the bat, both of which help managing EXP.

 

While there is no "correct way" or playing Reborn etc.,  especially the early game is clearly built with the intent of making players pick mons that get overlooked. Sticking to your favorites only is counter-productive. If you still prefer to do that, then yeah, it's good to have some Reverse/Common Candies.

[Jess]

11 minutes ago, Zargerth said:

These little sweets aren't limited to one fan-game, so that's why I post this topic here. My examples will mostly be of Reborn and Rejuvenation, though.

 

I understand that it's handy to have something that decreases your Pokemons level, should you over-level it past your current level cap. However, depending on your point of view there's a drawback to this - Common Candies take away the emphasis of managing your EXP early on. There's no need to worry about it all: your Charmeleon leveled up to lvl 26 before Florinia? Just use a Common Candy or two. In my opinion especially in the early game there's an abundance of EXP and the level cap is easy to reach without (much) grinding. The fact that Common Candies make managing your EXP less of an issue can be either a good or bad thing. 

 

That's not all there is to them, though. I don't know if it was intended, but with Common Candies you can have "illegal" mons in the sense that they're lower level than what they actually should be. You can evolve your Charmeleon to Charizard, then bring it back to level 35 before battling Shelly, for example. I'm guilty of doing this myself, so I'm not actually judging anybody. One level may not seem that bad to you, but what if I used over 20 Reverse Candies? I can now have one or more level 1 Donphans with Sturdy- ability that know both Endeavor and Ice Shard. They're basically F.E.A.R with Focus Sashes of their own. There's a reason why Berry Juices were removed from vendors in Gearen City...

 

In my experience later on lowering your levels becomes rather irrelevant, I find myself more often under-leveled (my team is several levels lower than the Gym Leaders) than over-leveled. Grinding also becomes more relevant, especially if you wanted to train a new mon or two. Sometimes I feel like the availability or Common/Reverse and Rare Candies should be, well, reversed: by making Reverse or Common Candies more rare there's more emphasis on managing your EXP, as well as by making Rare Candies more common grinding and leveling up becomes easy and less time-consuming. You still can't level up past the level cap, unless you prefer battling with over-leveled mons who don't obey you.

 

What are your thoughts on Reverse and Common Candies? Are they fine the way they're now, or should something be changed?

 

TL;DR: Reverse/Common Candies make managing your EXP pretty much a non-issue, and also allow you to use low-level fully evolved mons.

Jan has already announced that, in version 10 of Rejuvenation, we won't be able to level-up our 'mons over the level cap by any other way than feeding them a Rare Candy. Which is expensive/rare enough to be punishing enough if you want to do it for like 20 levels. The 1 level-evolution thing is not such a big deal in my opinion. I've defeated Marianette in my Rejuv. run by evolving Typhlosion and reteaching it Eruption (cause fuck that Bewear), so I've abused this as well. But you can only do this with 2-3 mons (mostly starters) that evolve in 36 early game and, even if you do it, you only have one Heart Scale available to relearn moves (always in Rejuv.).

In Reborn it's even worse. You have no mining kit before Shelly, so money is a struggle and Rare Candy costs 20 fucking thousand. Also, move relearner is not available till defeating Aya. I think that, if Reborn implements the same system as Jan's v10 plan, it will be perfectly balanaced and limit such things to the minimum.

The change in Daycare where your 'mons don't get a level-up in Gen VII will stop you from leaving them there and just ALT+bicycle around to overlevel your mons for move breeding too...

[Walpurgis]

I personally think that the level cap mechanic Rejuvenation will be introducing in V10 (disabling the experience gain once a pokemon has reached the cap) is the best way to deal with all of this issues. You can't pass the level cap without using rare candies -> this allows the developers to put a lot of non-gym battles between gyms without having to worry about the player gaining too much experience and solving the grinding issue at the same time -> you don't need common/reverse candies, people won't have problems with accidental overleveling (in the middle of a gym battle, for example) -> they could be made much rarer or even unavailable, like rare candies.

You can still use rare candies and common candies to have illegal movesets/pokemon, but you are much more limited by their availability. 

[Wolfox]

10 minutes ago, Zargerth said:

This is a fair point. I'd like to point out, however, that if you take some time and get acquainted with Reborns (or whatever fan-game you're playing) mechanics, you should be able to find out about the level caps. I also question whether you need an endless supply of Reverse Candies as a safety net. What I liked about the Hardcore Mod was that it gave you both Exp. Share and Lucky Egg right off the bat, both of which help managing EXP.

 

While there is no "correct way" or playing Reborn etc.,  especially the early game is clearly built with the intent of making players pick mons that get overlooked. Sticking to your favorites only is counter-productive. If you still prefer to do that, then yeah, it's good to have some Reverse/Common Candies.

Infinite is not needed for a safety net, but there have been many moments where I was happy I stacked up on them because (for example for the home invasion where you battle with Florinia). Also, I personally think that the common candy + level cap mechanic's make reborn as good as it is because while the candies make it easier to manage the level cap it's still not at all easy depending on your team. And I never mentioned the word Favorite, did I? I said: " mons you wanna use ". It can be pretty hard to change your team up when for example you're taking on Team Meteor in their base in Tanzan Mountain (Yes, I know you can do it because you can just go back to the mansion), and then the Common Candies shine.

[Zargerth]

7 minutes ago, Jess said:

Jan has already announced that, in version 10 of Rejuvenation, we won't be able to level-up our 'mons over the level cap by any other way than feeding them a Rare Candy.

Is this similar to Insurgence where once you hit the level cap your mons receive 1 EXP only?

 

9 minutes ago, Jess said:

I've defeated Marianette in my Rejuv. run by evolving Typhlosion and reteaching it Eruption (cause fuck that Bewear), so I've abused this as well. But you can only do this with 2-3 mons (mostly starters) that evolve in 36 early game and, even if you do it, you only have one Heart Scale available to relearn moves (always in Rejuv.).

I don't know what her team is in Normal Mode, but I'd say Intense is more difficult and thus restricting by definition. You have access to several Psychic- and Fairy-types, who can use their field-boosted STABs against Bewear, targeting it's low Sp. Defense.

 

You're correct on that not many mons benefit from the one-level decrease, but one good example in both Reborn and Rejuv is Litleo. It learns Flamethrower at lvl 36, so you can have lvl 35 Pyroar with Flamethrower against both Shelly and Marianette.

 

15 minutes ago, Jess said:

The change in Daycare where your 'mons don't get a level-up in Gen VII will stop you from leaving them there and just ALT+bicycle around to overlevel your mons for move breeding too...

I didn't even think of this. I haven't done much breeding in any Pokemon game whatsoever.

[Wolfox]

Insurgence has a level cap? I never f*cking knew that... I legit never even hit the cap once

[Jess]

Just now, Zargerth said:

Is this similar to Insurgence where once you hit the level cap your mons receive 1 EXP only?

Yes, identical.

 

1 minute ago, Zargerth said:

I don't know what her team is in Normal Mode, but I'd say Intense is more difficult and thus restricting by definition. You have access to several Psychic- and Fairy-types, who can use their field-boosted STABs against Bewear, targeting it's low Sp. Defense.

 

You're correct on that not many mons benefit from the one-level decrease, but one good example in both Reborn and Rejuv is Litleo. It learns Flamethrower at lvl 36, so you can have lvl 35 Pyroar with Flamethrower against both Shelly and Marianette.

I was playing in Intense too, and doing a rodent-only run (with only 2 additions, a dog and a bear-like 'mons). So, No Fairies/Psychic types till then for me. Maybe Alolan Raichu, but I hadn't trained it up. Pichu refused to evolve. Ooops?

 

2 minutes ago, Zargerth said:

I didn't even think of this. I haven't done much breeding in any Pokemon game whatsoever.

I hated it when a move I was trying to breed got deleted. And then it couldn't be relearned by move relearner sometimes. Grrrrr. But I think we need to have 2 daycares, a level one which would stop leveling up your mons at level cap and a breeding one that won't level them up at all.

[Jess]

7 minutes ago, Wolfox said:

Insurgence has a level cap? I never f*cking knew that... I legit never even hit the cap once

In Hard mode, it does. Great feature, gotta give it to them!

[FairFamily]

I think your issue is overshooting the problem. The level cap never meant to introduce exp manahement. It just meant to make sure you can't grind yourself to victory. 

 

That being said the new level cap which really caps levels is prefered over the old since some fangames had poor exp management.

[Zargerth]

27 minutes ago, Wolfox said:

Infinite is not needed for a safety net, but there have been many moments where I was happy I stacked up on them because (for example for the home invasion where you battle with Florinia). Also, I personally think that the common candy + level cap mechanic's make reborn as good as it is because while the candies make it easier to manage the level cap it's still not at all easy depending on your team. And I never mentioned the word Favorite, did I? I said: " mons you wanna use ". It can be pretty hard to change your team up when for example you're taking on Team Meteor in their base in Tanzan Mountain (Yes, I know you can do it because you can just go back to the mansion), and then the Common Candies shine.

My mistake. But since "mons you wanna use" doesn't seem to have any context to it, it can mean literally anything, including but not limited to your current team as well as mons you are still leveling up for the upcoming Gym battle(s). It also doesn't make distinction between temporary mons and your main team of 6 mons. In other words, using mons you wanna use doesn't necessarily lead to a situation where plethora of Common Candies is needed.

 

I have to admit that in situations where you have to battle several opponents in a row Reverse Candies come in handy, but you can already find a good amount of them without having to buy any (or just some). Common/Reverse Candies can be useful, but how many of them is enough?

14 minutes ago, FairFamily said:

I think your issue is overshooting the problem. The level cap never meant to introduce exp manahement. It just meant to make sure you can't grind yourself to victory. 

 

That being said the new level cap which really caps levels is prefered over the old since some fangames had poor exp management.

Perhaps so, but I believe EXP management naturally follows: it's still not a good idea to let one of your mons hog all the EXP. For instance, you can go through the Obsidia Slums and Onyx Trainer School with just one mon and get easily over-leveled without doing any active grinding per se.

 

37 minutes ago, walpurgis said:

I personally think that the level cap mechanic Rejuvenation will be introducing in V10 (disabling the experience gain once a pokemon has reached the cap) is the best way to deal with all of this issues. You can't pass the level cap without using rare candies -> this allows the developers to put a lot of non-gym battles between gyms without having to worry about the player gaining too much experience and solving the grinding issue at the same time -> you don't need common/reverse candies, people won't have problems with accidental overleveling (in the middle of a gym battle, for example) -> they could be made much rarer or even unavailable, like rare candies.

You can still use rare candies and common candies to have illegal movesets/pokemon, but you are much more limited by their availability. 

I'm okay with this. The availability of Common Candies is one of the primary reasons for players being able to use "illegal" mons to begin with.

[Candy]

Imo a better mechanic is Insurgence's which only gives you 1 Exp or something when you are at the level cap

[Wolfox]

Just now, Candy said:

Imo a better mechanic is Insurgence's which only gives you 1 Exp or something when you are at the level cap

Insurgence outclassing Reborn? *looks at the sky* how many blue moons have passed?

[Candy]

2 minutes ago, Wolfox said:

Insurgence outclassing Reborn? *looks at the sky* how many blue moons have passed?

One must give credit where it's due my fren xD

[Salad Table]

The only reason I've had to use common candies is because of training new members though exp share, and my main team goes above the limit, or the same problem happened when I EV trained my team before the Titania gym battle. Don't really see how this mechanic is a problem.