The Walrein
Well-Known Member
How strong are Pokemon powers and abilities in your fics? Can a pidgey's gust lift a fully grown human off their feet and send them flying through the air, or can it only blow their hat off? Can an abra teleport across an entire continent in a single bound, or would they struggle to make ten meters? Can a charmander wade through lava without harm, or could they burn themselves with a cigarette lighter if they weren't careful?
My own writing usually tends towards the lower end of the power scale, but there are pros and cons on both ends of the spectrum. Here's what I see as the advantages of each approach:
Low Power
- Easier to suspend disbelief during nonlethal battles: If the average Pokemon attack can smash through a concrete barrier with ease, it can be a little hard to swallow that the Pokemon themselves can take those attacks and only receive slight bruises.
- Easier to set up obstacles that are difficult for the protagonists to overcome: The more powerful Pokemon are, the harder it is to threaten them with 'mundane' dangers like being trapped in a burning building or falling off a cliff.
- Easier to portray a distinct range of 'power-levels': If an abra can lift an apple with their telekinesis, a kadabra can lift a bowling ball, and an alakazam can lift a steel safe, than it's easy to show that Mewtwo's really strong by having them fling around cars and boulders with their psychic powers. But if even the abra can pick up a car, you're going to have to show the kadabra flinging around buses, the alakazam hurtling around tractor-trailers, and you're going to have to contrive a battleship lying around or something if you want Mewtwo to be able to show off. At least to me, all feats beyond a certain level tend to blur together somewhat, while I feel like keeping powers within the general range of things humans could do makes them easier to intuitively understand and compare against each other.
- Makes settings where humans fight alongside or against Pokemon in combat more plausible
- Easier to avoid plot-holes caused by various super-abilities: If you have a character with very-long range teleportation (especially if they can bring other characters with them), you're always going to have to think about, "well, why don't they just solve problem X by teleporting to place Y?" while that's not a probem if they're limited to teleporting across the room. Also, having strong powers can cause a lot of worldbuilding implications you might not want to deal with ("if any ghost pokemon can turn invisible and phase through walls, how do people protect their valuables in this world?")
High Power
- Easier to justify stories where individual trainers take on massive criminal organizations with just the strength of their teams, or where individual trainers can otherwise wield a lot of power: The stronger mass-produced forms of power like guns and technology are relative to Pokemon abilities, the more advantage a large number of grunts has versus one trainer with a strong team.
- Good for creating a sense of awe or 'epicness'
- Can allow for tactics and plots that wouldn't be possible with weaker powers
How powerful are Pokemon in your stories? What do you see as the advantages and disadvantages of high-power and low-power settings?
My own writing usually tends towards the lower end of the power scale, but there are pros and cons on both ends of the spectrum. Here's what I see as the advantages of each approach:
Low Power
- Easier to suspend disbelief during nonlethal battles: If the average Pokemon attack can smash through a concrete barrier with ease, it can be a little hard to swallow that the Pokemon themselves can take those attacks and only receive slight bruises.
- Easier to set up obstacles that are difficult for the protagonists to overcome: The more powerful Pokemon are, the harder it is to threaten them with 'mundane' dangers like being trapped in a burning building or falling off a cliff.
- Easier to portray a distinct range of 'power-levels': If an abra can lift an apple with their telekinesis, a kadabra can lift a bowling ball, and an alakazam can lift a steel safe, than it's easy to show that Mewtwo's really strong by having them fling around cars and boulders with their psychic powers. But if even the abra can pick up a car, you're going to have to show the kadabra flinging around buses, the alakazam hurtling around tractor-trailers, and you're going to have to contrive a battleship lying around or something if you want Mewtwo to be able to show off. At least to me, all feats beyond a certain level tend to blur together somewhat, while I feel like keeping powers within the general range of things humans could do makes them easier to intuitively understand and compare against each other.
- Makes settings where humans fight alongside or against Pokemon in combat more plausible
- Easier to avoid plot-holes caused by various super-abilities: If you have a character with very-long range teleportation (especially if they can bring other characters with them), you're always going to have to think about, "well, why don't they just solve problem X by teleporting to place Y?" while that's not a probem if they're limited to teleporting across the room. Also, having strong powers can cause a lot of worldbuilding implications you might not want to deal with ("if any ghost pokemon can turn invisible and phase through walls, how do people protect their valuables in this world?")
High Power
- Easier to justify stories where individual trainers take on massive criminal organizations with just the strength of their teams, or where individual trainers can otherwise wield a lot of power: The stronger mass-produced forms of power like guns and technology are relative to Pokemon abilities, the more advantage a large number of grunts has versus one trainer with a strong team.
- Good for creating a sense of awe or 'epicness'
- Can allow for tactics and plots that wouldn't be possible with weaker powers
How powerful are Pokemon in your stories? What do you see as the advantages and disadvantages of high-power and low-power settings?