New Mechanic Idea: Yay or Nay?

[ty_taurus]

So I've been thinking about the potential to change up a little about how Hidden Power type works and some other ways that it could become more integrated into the games mechanics. It's something that would drastically change up game play, probably larger than any other mechanic ever introduced to Pokemon, so I don't necessarily know if it would be a change for the better or the worse, so I wanted to see what you all think.

 

So let's talk about Hidden Power. It's an interesting move that allows a lot of Pokemon, particularly weaker ones, to obtain type coverage they can't ordinarily access. It's not perfect though. Its power isn't stellar, the game isn't transparent about what type each Pokemon's hidden power is without visiting a specific NPC, and it's exclusive to special attackers. But what if this all changed?

 

Concept: Every Pokemon has a Hidden Type. This hidden type would be an all-new variable detached from IVs that would impact Pokemon in potentially 3 ways...

- Hidden Power: A special attack that always has attack power 70. It is available to every Pokemon via TM and functions as the type that match's the user's hidden type. (This is largely unchanged)

- Secret Power: Now is the physical attack version of Hidden Power, and also is always attack power 70. It is also available to every Pokemon via TM. *EDIT* Could also be a completely new move*

*EDIT*: One potential new addition to the above could be that normal type Pokemon always get STAB on these moves regardless of hidden type to emphasis the theme of normal Pokemon being more versatile than other types.

 

The biggest of the three:

- Pokemon with max happiness will resist attacks that match the user's hidden type (applied on top of their current resistances and weaknesses).

   Examples:

   - A water Pokemon with the hidden type: ghost will resist ghost attacks

   - A fairy Pokemon with the hidden type: poison will take neutral damage from poison attacks

   - A fire/flying Pokemon with the hidden type: rock will take double damage from rock attacks

 

Hidden type can now be seen in combat by the HP bar of all participating Pokemon; however, an opponent's hidden type will remain hidden until:

- They are hit with an attack that matches their hidden type (Ex. If a Pokemon with the hidden type: fire is hit with a fire attack).

- One or more of the Player's Pokemon has one of these abilities: Analytic, Anticipation, Keen Eye.

 

Pokemon with one of these abilities will ignore an opponent's hidden type when attacking: Infiltrator, Unaware (Ex. Unaware Clefable's Moonblast will still deal 4x damage to a Kommo-o with the hidden type: fairy).

 

Certain new moves could be added to manipulate hidden type, or current moves could gain said ability.

 

Visiting the Pokemon Aura Specialist NPC and paying some form of restrictive currency (similarly to bottle caps in Ultra Smoon) will allow you to alter the hidden type of one of your Pokemon to another type of your choosing.

 

Pros and Cons...

 

Pros:

- Hidden type now becomes more transparent, making it easier for hardcore players to pay attention to, and more accessible for young and casual players to learn about.

- All Pokemon now benefit from hidden types, not just special attackers.

 

Cons:

- It's an all new system to learn and would require time for everyone to get used to the new mechanics.

- Maybe Con?: An added resistance that players can choose is a MASSIVE change, and I can't say if it would be for the better or worse.

 

Possible alternatives:

In the event the idea seems too extreme, there are ways that it could be mitigated so it's less demanding. Here are some other ideas that could work in place of the added resistance if that seems too much for some people. If you think it's too much, share which of these ideas seems better, or if you have a better idea yourself:

- Hidden type resistance reduces damage by 25% instead of 50%, essentially making it a half-resist, thus less impacting but still helpful, like Filter or Solid Rock.

- Hidden type resistance overrides a Pokemon's natural resistance if that type would be neutral or super effective (Ex. a fire/flying Pokemon would resist a rock attack instead of take 4x damage); however, this effect only applies once per battle.

- Instead of having a hidden type resistance, the move Hidden Aura places a 5-turn barrier on your side of the field (similar to screens) that makes all Pokemon on the user's side of the field resist the user's hidden type unless they would unless they would otherwise be immune or absorb that type (like in the above example). If overriding is too much, then a simple resistance is added to all Pokemon on the user's side of the field instead (Ex. a fire/flying Pokemon would take 2x damage from a rock attack instead of 4x damage).

 

Share what you think of these ideas below along with what kind of changes you might do to it if you think it needs to be changed.

[ShogokiX]

The idea in itself sounds interesting. However, rather than changing an existing attack, i would implement a new attack that is basicly hidden power just physical instead of special. It could be named something like "hidden force" that is close to hidden power in terms of naming.

 

Also while i DO like the idea of being able to choose your hidden power / "hidden force" type at will by talking to a special NPC i don't like the idea of a hidden type that alters a Pokémons weaknesses or resistances in any way. You might remember the fact that Sableye and Spiritomb had no weakness at all until Gen 6 introduced fairy type. With your idea of giving them resistance to their hidden type they would end up in a state close to what they were in Gen 5.

 

To summarize: The idea of a base attack value 70 hidden power and "hidden force" as its physical counterpart is nice. Being able to choose the type of that attack would make these moves a very good coverage move on every Mon. The idea of having a method to see what kind of hidden power / "hidden force" your opponents Pokémon has would also be nice. Also hidden power / "hidden force" should always display it's type on your own Pokémon from the attack menu in combat or its attack page in summary.

[ty_taurus]

Adding the physical Hidden Power as a different move works too, for sure. And I do agree that it would be nice if the type icon properly displayed.

 

As for the resistance concept, I do think there should be some reason to give defensive Pokemon a reason to think about their hidden type. I hear you on the "no weaknesses" issue, and while Spiritomb certainly never won any awards for being even remotely effective in battle, Mega-Sableye would put that to much better use. That's not even including a lot of other options like basically any pure electric Pokemon doing the same with ground attacks, and other examples like Scizor softening his major fire weakness.

 

I do think that there would be some room to experiment and test out the mechanic with a bit more emphasis on ways to play around with hidden type when it comes to abilities and moves. Imagine, for example, a move like Trick Room and Wonder Room called something like "Hidden Room" which caused all hidden types to apply a weakness instead of a resistance?

 

If I were actually desiging the game, though, I wouldn't just release these changes. I would be very transparent about the concept and release a free demo that would be like a Pokemon Showdown clone with the Ultra Smoon Pokedex (Not the national dex) that included these changes along with some new abilities and moves revolving around this stuff and poll the community on their thoughts.

[Damage]

Speaking as a more casual pokemaner, I can say this concept sounds like a ton of fun. Although I more agree with turning the resistance part into a setup instead of a natural new part of the pokemon. Making it have to be a setup would mean a pokemon like Dragonite with its ability to mitigate dmg at full health along with cutting ice and fairy attacks in half and possibly in a strong wind zone where some attacks already deal less would be prevented from being a god for a full battle if it had some form of recovery. I'm sure within the 800+ mons in the game there would be a few that would end up turning a fun new mechanic into an absolute chore to deal with. (even unintentionally) Then you'd have to account for how much longer a fight would go on if every single mon had essentially double the defense. A twenty minute match is tough and fun and has turns and twists. A forty minute match is a little less tolerable. The HP/SP should imo be more offense than defense since the original idea was to help with coverage. The defense idea sounds like it could end up being more trouble for the less casual player and more sleepless nights for the hardcore one.

 

TLDR; offense changes yes. defensive ones nah.

[ShogokiX]

While i do see your point about the possibilities this could have on the defensive side i am siding with @Damage on this one. These changes in defense could bloat up a fight way too much and possibly even negate the offensive changes.

 

Let me give you an example. I liked to play my Cradily with fire type Hidden Power, the other moves being Stockpile, Giga Drain and Recover, and of course Storm Drain as its ability. The main reason for Hidden Power is coverage, since my build is defensive, as you can see. Now imagine steel or ice type Pokémon (which would easily kill Cradily) using your hidden type defensive mechanics to defend against fire attacks. Hidden Power would become useless, since it does not hit the enemies weakness any more.

[SoraBell]

In competitive this could have some nasty implications. Dragon type Pokémon that are notoriously weak to ice like mence or chomp would carry hp Fire and now would only be 2x weak to ice making them way more bulky. The most scary example would be t-tar with hp fairy, immune to fairy resist fighting which is your best bet against it.

 

unless I’m misunderstanding. Idk as this could become very difficult to keep track of outside of a competitive lenses.

[ty_taurus]

18 minutes ago, SoraBell said:

In competitive this could have some nasty implications. Dragon type Pokémon that are notoriously weak to ice like mence or chomp would carry hp Fire and now would only be 2x weak to ice making them way more bulky. The most scary example would be t-tar with hp fairy, immune to fairy resist fighting which is your best bet against it.

 

unless I’m misunderstanding. Idk as this could become very difficult to keep track of outside of a competitive lenses.

 

No the original idea was that you got a resistance of only your Pokemon's hidden type, so if you wanted to cut out ice attacks, you'd have to carry hp ice basically, but I'm personally leaning toward the idea of it maybe just being a once-per-battle resist anyway, or even something more niche, just because even then, anyone who doesn't feel obligated to carry a hidden type offensively would just use it to negate a weakness. I'd need to think more about how to create a good option for defensive Pokemon to care about their hidden type.

[SoraBell]

I don’t think that’s a good idea, if it was properly portrayed to your opponent. It’d make bulkier Pokémon way harder to deal with

[Swampellow]

The main problem I see with this is that you wouldn’t even have to carry hidden power to gain the benefit from the resist. You could run a completely normal move set on a Pokémon, like Ferrothorn for example, set its IVs so that it had HP Fire, and then have a Ferrothorn that could now shrug off some fire attacks while still being able to do everything it is normally capable of.

[Des Teto]

Your idea made me think about Smogon's Other Metagames. Users may create new competitive battles by changing only one rule or adding new ones. Some metas are pretty funny! It turns out something close to your idea already exists here. It says 'The Pokemon's Hidden Power type will be Added to its type(s)'.

 

I remember now seeing competitive fights with this rule. Mega Mawile gained the Dark STAB on Sucker Punch and became even more aggressive than it is today.

[ty_taurus]

On 5/20/2019 at 10:19 AM, Des Teto said:

Your idea made me think about Smogon's Other Metagames. Users may create new competitive battles by changing only one rule or adding new ones. Some metas are pretty funny! It turns out something close to your idea already exists here. It says 'The Pokemon's Hidden Power type will be Added to its type(s)'.

 

I remember now seeing competitive fights with this rule. Mega Mawile gained the Dark STAB on Sucker Punch and became even more aggressive than it is today.

 

Interesting. Maybe with that in mind, there's room for that sort of mechanic as a different kind of gimmick battle that could be implemented as maybe the main method in a fixed location (similar to one area of Platinum's Battle Frontier) that could be a select-able option for battling other players? That way it doesn't change the core gameplay, but becomes a more recognizable secondary game mode, and one that's more open than stuff like Flying Battles which only last a generation. That being said, there was also rotation battles before and those didn't last either.