What makes RBY... RBY?
Jan 21, 2013 20:35:53 GMT -8
Post by jorgen on Jan 21, 2013 20:35:53 GMT -8
AgentSyrup is trying to make a restricted Gen II tier that captures the feel of RBY. However, the criteria he is using to define "that RBY feel" are unknown to me. So, I figured I'd start a little thread asking people: what traits make RBY... RBY?
To start off, I'd say the following traits characterize RBY pretty well:
-Randomness: Where there's a Tauros, there's a way. RBY is a game where you're playing the odds pretty often. The balance of playing the odds vs. playing against your opponent is tipped more in favor of the odds than most other games I'm aware of, including other Pokemon generations. Most of this has to do with the facts that, in RBY, crit-boosted average damage rates are non-negligible and status is generally way more impactful and can't be easily removed.
-Small degree of customization of starting conditions: In many board games, each player ends up with the same number and same setup of pieces. In RBY, there is a limited degree of customization. You can run some gimmicks like Counter Chansey, Surf Lax, or pick between things like Jynx, Lapras, Gengar, etc. for a couple of your Pokemon slots. However, note that "small degree" is key. RBY is not NEARLY as customizable as even GSC, with basically 4 Pokemon in RBY being pretty much mandatory on any serious team and usually only 1 set being viable on any given Pokemon.
-Bistable: Now, theres probably people that will disagree with this (and I expect them to, especially since this is a weird suggestion), but to me, after the opening ceremonies where people get something put to sleep, there's really two broad states a game could fall under. One is spreading paralysis aggressively and double-switching things like Snorlax, Rhydon, and Tauros into paralyzed foes to smash your way through your opponent. The other is switching in Chansey or Alakazam or something to stall and possibly play for the freeze. There's a nice 2x2 matrix of what beats what based on status propagation, too - for example, unparalyzed stalling loses to paralyzed stalling, but para'd stalling loses to aggro; aggro loses to unpara'd stalling, wins against para'd. Obviously, this is really broad, simplified, and abstract, but the main point is that there are two basic, perfectly-playable "gears" that oscillate between better/worse than the other style of play based on the situation - i.e., RBY games feel "bistable".
-Frequent Risky Scenarios: RBY generally feels like a much riskier game than something like GSC. Not just in terms of the randomness factor, but also in terms of what your opponent can do. Dodging Explosions vs. leaving that Chansey in, trying to predict that Hyper Beam versus risking eating it to get off an extra attack, choosing whether to boom or not, and deciding whether to hit Body Slam or EQ with Snorlax are all pretty common and are all do-or-die situations. If an RBY game is fairly even, it WILL be decided either by the Tauros ditto uncertainty or some do-or-die, 50/50 gamble. Don't confuse this with the randomness factor; that deals with the large variance in the outcome of a single turn based on the RNG. This, rather, deals with the frequency at which you see specific pivotal turns that decide matches or at least give a heavy advantage to a single player.
Anybody else have any ideas/rebuttals? For AgentSyrup's sake, so he can make his RBY-like GSC metagame with a better sense of direction
To start off, I'd say the following traits characterize RBY pretty well:
-Randomness: Where there's a Tauros, there's a way. RBY is a game where you're playing the odds pretty often. The balance of playing the odds vs. playing against your opponent is tipped more in favor of the odds than most other games I'm aware of, including other Pokemon generations. Most of this has to do with the facts that, in RBY, crit-boosted average damage rates are non-negligible and status is generally way more impactful and can't be easily removed.
-Small degree of customization of starting conditions: In many board games, each player ends up with the same number and same setup of pieces. In RBY, there is a limited degree of customization. You can run some gimmicks like Counter Chansey, Surf Lax, or pick between things like Jynx, Lapras, Gengar, etc. for a couple of your Pokemon slots. However, note that "small degree" is key. RBY is not NEARLY as customizable as even GSC, with basically 4 Pokemon in RBY being pretty much mandatory on any serious team and usually only 1 set being viable on any given Pokemon.
-Bistable: Now, theres probably people that will disagree with this (and I expect them to, especially since this is a weird suggestion), but to me, after the opening ceremonies where people get something put to sleep, there's really two broad states a game could fall under. One is spreading paralysis aggressively and double-switching things like Snorlax, Rhydon, and Tauros into paralyzed foes to smash your way through your opponent. The other is switching in Chansey or Alakazam or something to stall and possibly play for the freeze. There's a nice 2x2 matrix of what beats what based on status propagation, too - for example, unparalyzed stalling loses to paralyzed stalling, but para'd stalling loses to aggro; aggro loses to unpara'd stalling, wins against para'd. Obviously, this is really broad, simplified, and abstract, but the main point is that there are two basic, perfectly-playable "gears" that oscillate between better/worse than the other style of play based on the situation - i.e., RBY games feel "bistable".
-Frequent Risky Scenarios: RBY generally feels like a much riskier game than something like GSC. Not just in terms of the randomness factor, but also in terms of what your opponent can do. Dodging Explosions vs. leaving that Chansey in, trying to predict that Hyper Beam versus risking eating it to get off an extra attack, choosing whether to boom or not, and deciding whether to hit Body Slam or EQ with Snorlax are all pretty common and are all do-or-die situations. If an RBY game is fairly even, it WILL be decided either by the Tauros ditto uncertainty or some do-or-die, 50/50 gamble. Don't confuse this with the randomness factor; that deals with the large variance in the outcome of a single turn based on the RNG. This, rather, deals with the frequency at which you see specific pivotal turns that decide matches or at least give a heavy advantage to a single player.
Anybody else have any ideas/rebuttals? For AgentSyrup's sake, so he can make his RBY-like GSC metagame with a better sense of direction
