Team Skull, Aether Foundation and Plot Discussion Thread [Contains Story Spoilers]

[Xuxuba]

And that was ripped off from Blaine in Gen I. Gen IV had one that was a ripoff of Blaine as well. Every gym puzzle in Gen VI was something from Gens I-III. At least the Sophocles trial was a new take on it. I was always able to play through without sound before this.

Kiawe's trial was obviously a joke, Mallow's could have been a PITA if you didn't know where to find stuff. That one took me almost as long as the others combined. But it was different.

Just because it's a quiz doesn't mean it's a rip-off. They involved completely different types of questions. It wasn't hard, but it was fun, and the gym looked amazing, like most of the XY gyms did. Sophomore's trial was just three questions (or maybe four) that required you to beat a wild pokemon, which isn't more exciting than beating a trainer, because trainers can actually talk, have a personality, use items and have more than one pokemon.

It makes no sense for a serious character like Kiawe to have, if you allow me to borrow your words, a joke as a trial. Keep in mind that a quest can be both funny and exciting, one thing doesn't exclude the other. I agree that Mallow's trial could be a challenge, and it's actually one of the few i liked, but the fetching quest is unoriginal for a rpg and it doesn't really compensate for the others trials being so lame.

I will give something to the trials though and it's that they are far better at displaying the captain's personality and his/her background than the gyms were.

... I've beat the game and haven't had to grind even once.

Not to mention, in most previous Pokémon games there weren't many grinding places either.

Grinding is not necessary to beat the game, but it's necessary for other things, such as learning moves, evolving pokemon, using bottle caps and etc... Therefore, it does affect the enjoyment of the game.

I don't know which games you played, but the previous games certainly had lot of places to grind thanks to the battle restaurants and battle chateau (xy) and lots of rematchable trainers (oras).

 

[clbgolden12]

Just because it's a quiz doesn't mean it's a rip-off. They involved completely different types of questions. It wasn't hard, but it was fun, and the gym looked amazing, like most of the XY gyms did. Sophomore's trial was just three questions (or maybe four) that required you to beat a wild pokemon, which isn't more exciting than beating a trainer, because trainers can actually talk, have a personality, use items and have more than one pokemon.

Funny you say that, because all the Trainers at Lumiose have only one Pokémon, and knowing most generic gym NPCs, probably use no items and probably don't have much of a personality. This is the case for every XY gym until Wulfric, which is the last gym.

It makes no sense for a serious character like Kiawe have, if you allow me to borrow your words, a joke as a trial.

I'm pretty sure that's supposed to be part of the joke, being ironic and all.

Grinding is not necessary to beat the game, but it's necessary for other things, such as learning moves, evolving pokemon, using bottle caps and etc... Therefore, it does affect the enjoyment of the game.

I don't know which games you played, but the previous games certainly had lot of places to grind thanks to the battle restaurants and battle chateau (xy) and lots of rematchable trainers (oras).

But I'm not talking about grinding post-game, I'm talking about during the main game. I'll admit that there aren't many places to grind post-game tho.

(But what rematches did ORAS have? All I can remember is Wally, and to face him you complete the Super challenge for every rank, which is super hard.)

 

[RedJirachi]

OK guys, who do think is a worse parent; Ghetsis or Lusamine?

 

[clbgolden12]

OK guys, who do think is a worse parent; Ghetsis or Lusamine?

Lusamine. Ghetsis may have disowned and manipulated his child, but Lusamine disowned her child and tried to kill (or attack at the very least) one of them. It's even worse in her case as it was her actual children and not adopted like in Ghetsis' case.

 

[Prakhar]

I don't get why everyone is saying the trials are unoriginal. They were the best part about the game.
Even kisses trial was a bit funny, and made me smile (I never laugh in video games) a few times. Sophocles had audio questions, Audio!

 

[Tropios]

(But what rematches did ORAS have? All I can remember is Wally, and to face him you complete the Super challenge for every rank, which is super hard.)

...you did know that you could register a good chunk of all trainers in Hoenn in your pokenav to rematch them later right?

I have to admit that I'm not a fan of GameFreak's tendency to never put rematches in the first games of a new gen.

 

[clbgolden12]

...you did know that you could register a good chunk of all trainers in Hoenn in your pokenav to rematch them later right?

I have to admit that I'm not a fan of GameFreak's tendency to never put rematches in the first games of a new gen.

... Oh, yeah.

I never used it much as I mainly used Secret Bases for grinding...

 

[Mrs. Oreo]

When I first saw Guzma, I thought he'd specialize in dark types or poison types at least since I thought that his type specialty would coincide with the thuggish theme of Team Skull. So I'm surprised yet kind of glad that Guzma uses bug types, which I feel are underrated in general. ^^

 

[Red and Blue]

OK guys, who do think is a worse parent; Ghetsis or Lusamine?

I'd say Ghestis. At least Lusamine was a good parent before her husband disappeared.

 

[Taodragon]

I think we can all agree that nobody here has said gen 6 was more challenging. Gen 7 is certainly more challenging, but part of that challenge comes at the expense of not having many places to grind for exp, making the chore tiresome and boring.

I do think some of the gym puzzles (like Clemont's quiz) were more fun and thought out than certain trials (like Sophomore's quiz) though.

I disagree, between the Gen V exp system curbing the Exp. Share, some of the clever implementations of the Totem Pokémon and boss battles (ex. Lurantis having a Sunny Day Castform partner and Wishiwashi getting a medic in the form of Alomomola), and the trainer battles being slightly more properly balanced, Gen 7 was the more difficult game. With XY, even ignoring the Exp. Share, you had things like Wulfric not having a full moveset on one of his Pokémon, and Mega Evolution being much more powerful in-game then Z-moves (especially with some of the options like Lucario) that made the difficulty much weaker then its past and future counterparts.

OK guys, who do think is a worse parent; Ghetsis or Lusamine?

Still Ghetsis, at least Lusamine was nice before falling into madness and bounces back, Ghetsis was always abusive (or at least, manipulative and neglectful) to N.

 

[RedJirachi]

I disagree, between the Gen V exp system curbing the Exp. Share, some of the clever implementations of the Totem Pokémon and boss battles (ex. Lurantis having a Sunny Day Castform partner and Wishiwashi getting a medic in the form of Alomomola), and the trainer battles being slightly more properly balanced, Gen 7 was the more difficult game. With XY, even ignoring the Exp. Share, you had things like Wulfric not having a full moveset on one of his Pokémon, and Mega Evolution being much more powerful in-game then Z-moves (especially with some of the options like Lucario) that made the difficulty much weaker then its past and future counterparts.



Still Ghetsis, at least Lusamine was nice before falling into madness and bounces back, Ghetsis was always abusive (or at least, manipulative and neglectful) to N.

I wonder if it would've made Lusamine a more or less effective villain if she wasn't affected by the neurotoxins, and was just that evil. As of stands now, she's like Ragyo Kiryuin but sympathetic

 

[Aetius]

OK guys, who do think is a worse parent; Ghetsis or Lusamine?

Ghetsis gets the award.
From how I see it, Lusamine went nuts due to Nihilego's neurotoxins, which made her mind and emotions go out of control.
In fact, when she was fred from Nihilego's control, she complimented her daughter for becoming so beautiful and courageous, as if she didn't remember at all what had just transpired in the last few days.
That's my opinion at least.

 

[Tropios]

While under influence of the neurotoxins, Lusamine was a lot worse to Lillie than we've ever seen Ghetsis be to N though. I mean, when Lillie was begging her to not torture Nebby, whom she deeply cared about, to open the portal cause he might die, Lusamine basically was like 'Just watch me do it'. On top of that, she was about to kill her and the player character just before Solgaleo/Lunala intervened.

 

[Xuxuba]

Lusamine has a mental illness, Ghetsis is just a jerk.

Funny you say that, because all the Trainers at Lumiose have only one Pokémon, and knowing most generic gym NPCs, probably use no items and probably don't have much of a personality. This is the case for every XY gym until Wulfric, which is the last gym.

Which is a problem that wasn't fixed by making us fight weak wild pokemon.

I'm pretty sure that's supposed to be part of the joke, being ironic and all.

IMO, it's out of character and not really funny.

But I'm not talking about grinding post-game, I'm talking about during the main game. I'll admit that there aren't many places to grind post-game tho.

(But what rematches did ORAS have? All I can remember is Wally, and to face him you complete the Super challenge for every rank, which is super hard.

That doesn't affect only the post-game though. Some people like to fill part of their dex as they progress further in the story and not having many places to grind makes leveling and evolving pokemon just for the dex a pain. Some people also want to use certain pokemon on the main quest, pokemon that only obtain decent moves on high levels, but since we do not have many ways to grind, aside from wild pokemon, we have to stuck with terrible moves. Also, there are players like me who like to rotate their teams and use as many pokemon as possible, but without a reliable way to grind it's quite likely that all of your pokemon will be underleveled.
I guess you can use the PokéPelago, but there are many problems with that feature, like:
a) obviously, you're not going to be able to use those pokemon until they're done with their training
b) it takes a lot of time. You can use beans to make it a bit faster, but it still takes time and beans are necessary for upgrades, so you're better off keeping them.
c) they don't get evs there
d) the pokemon forget their moves there, so you have no control over your pokemon's moveset. Since the move relearner is only postgame, you're going to be stuck with those moves for a really long time.

I don't get why everyone is saying the trials are unoriginal. They were the best part about the game.
Even kisses trial was a bit funny, and made me smile (I never laugh in video games) a few times. Sophocles had audio questions, Audio!

Couldn't disagree more. Gameplay wise, i think the only part i liked about the trials was fighting the totem pokemon, because the quests you did before being able to face him were just terrible (aside from maybe Mallow's). The concept of audio questions is original, but, in the game itself, it wasn't all that much fun, especially when it's only 3 questions and you get interrupted by a wild weak a** pokemon every single time while not being able to see anything else.

 

[Tropios]

This whole trial discussion is kind of pointless though. One person can hate them and the other love them, you can't really argue personal preferences.

 

[goodpeople25]

Lusamine has a mental illness, Ghetsis is just a jerk.



Which is a problem that wasn't fixed by making us fight weak wild pokemon.


IMO, it's out of character and not really funny.


That doesn't affect only the post-game though. Some people like to fill part of their dex as they progress further in the story and not having many places to grind makes leveling and evolving pokemon just for the dex a pain. Some people also want to use certain pokemon on the main quest, pokemon that only obtain decent moves on high levels, but since we do not have many ways to grind, aside from wild pokemon, we have to stuck with terrible moves. Also, there are players like me who like to rotate their teams and use as many pokemon as possible, but without a reliable way to grind it's quite likely that all of your pokemon will be underleveled.
I guess you can use the PokéPelago, but there are many problems with that feature, like:
a) obviously, you're not going to be able to use those pokemon until they're done with their training
b) it takes a lot of time. You can use beans to make it a bit faster, but it still takes time and beans are necessary for upgrades, so you're better off keeping them.
c) they don't get evs there
d) the pokemon forget their moves there, so you have no control over your pokemon's moveset. Since the move relearner is only postgame, you're going to be stuck with those moves for a really long time.



Couldn't disagree more. I think the only part i liked about the trials was fighting the totem pokemon. The concept of audio questions is original, but, in the game itself, it wasn't all that much fun, especially when it's only 3 questions and you get interrupted by a wild weak a** pokemon every single time while not being able to see anything else.

Is in-game grinding really that much of an issue with new style exp share and exp scaling? (Well grinding to an average lvl for that point anyway, if you purposely overlevel more power to you but a game isn't always going to accommodate that) Yeah you'll be using wild Pokemon past a certain point but your still getting what around 1.5 total exp gain just from the exp share. (though over lvling if that isn't your thing is a possibility but one you can mitigate)

And what does learning moves really have to do with exp and grinding? Different pokemon will of course have different moves at different levels, and yeah your not always going to have great moves (though honestly I don't know your standards for great moves) and it also depends on what TMs you get when (and other factors like what lvls pokemon are in the wild), but that's just how the game works. You could overlevel to get past that issue, but that's just a way to get past it and is a separate issue.

And difficultly comes in many forms and factors, and getting exp is one of them. So bringing up both the seemingly reduced payout of exp grinding and having wild pokemon not trainers in the trials seems a bit at odds to me. Wild pokemon are the base for what you get out of a fight (though required legends of course give no exp and I'm not sure about totems or even trial Pokemon so this could all be a moot point) so they have that going for them difficulty wise, trainers aren't guaranteed to actually be worthy of the benefits of fighting them. (Though gym trainers were often better than average) But then I think the lay trainer is an often ignored/downplayed aspect of diffculty in pokemon.

 

[Xuxuba]

This whole trial discussion is kind of pointless though. One person can hate them and the other love them, you can't really argue personal preferences.

Then we might aswell close the thread and stop expressing our opinions and trying to see things from a different point of view, because there will never be a real, absolute answer to a discussion about a game's plot. Obviously, everything here is just a bunch of opinions.

Is in-game grinding really that much of an issue with new style exp share and exp scaling? (Well grinding to an average lvl for that point anyway, if you purposely overlevel more power to you but a game isn't always going to accommodate that) Yeah you'll be using wild Pokemon past a certain point but your still getting what around 1.5 total exp gain just from the exp share. (though over lvling if that isn't your thing is a possibility but one you can mitigate)

And what does learning moves really have to do with exp and grinding? Different pokemon will of course have different moves at different levels, and yeah your not always going to have great moves (though honestly I don't know your standards for great moves) and it also depends on what TMs you get when (and other factors like what lvls pokemon are in the wild), but that's just how the game works. You could overlevel to get past that issue, but that's just a way to get past it and is a separate issue.

And difficultly comes in many forms and factors, and getting exp is one of them. So bringing up both the seemingly reduced payout of exp grinding and having wild pokemon not trainers in the trials seems a bit at odds to me. Wild pokemon are the base for what you get out of a fight (though required legends of course give no exp and I'm not sure about totems or even trial Pokemon so this could all be a moot point) so they have that going for them difficulty wise, trainers aren't guaranteed to actually be worthy of the benefits of fighting them. (Though gym trainers were often better than average) But then I think the lay trainer is an often ignored/downplayed aspect of diffculty in pokemon.

I'm sorry, but i thought your text was really confusing. I'll try to answer it anyway.

Grinding is a chore and not giving you a faster way to do it is not really necessary to make the game difficult, since the game developers can just give the opponent stronger pokemon too.

Beating wild pokemon gives you less exp and it's less fun than beating trainers. 50% less might not seem like a lot to you, but with the Gen 5's exp system and without wild pokemon like Audino, it makes leveling pokemon tiresome, especially in a game where you have over 800 pokemon to catch and a lot of them require grinding to evolve or get decent (non op) moves.
Not to mention you can't enjoy the new bottle cap feature without leveling your pokemon to 100...

Also, there is a difference between something being hard and something being boring. Spamming a button while battling wild low level pokemon is not hard, it's just boring.

 

[Tropios]

Then we might aswell close the thread and stop expressing our opinions and trying to see things from a different point of view, because there will never be a real, absolute answer to a discussion about a game's plot. Obviously, everything here is just a bunch of opinions.

Yes, but when the discussion is basically just replying 'I think Kiawe's trial is funny/not funny' to eachother... Nothing personal, but I just think there's a difference between discussing opinions and trying to disprove each others opinions for 2 pages, but I digress, sorry for that.

 

[Xuxuba]

Yes, but when the discussion is basically just replying 'I think Kiawe's trial is funny/not funny' to eachother... Nothing personal, but I just think there's a difference between discussing opinions and trying to disprove each others opinions for 2 pages, but I digress, sorry for that.

I'm pretty sure that's not the only thing we are discussing here though.

 

[Hero of Truth]

Excuse me if this isn't the place for this, but isn't the Magearna event starting today for the US? And tomorrow for Europe?