Public Test: Exp. Rework

[Smooge]

Kanto:

gym1-8 was fully streamed on twitch
 

gym 1

dont have after gym, but i streamed it on twitch. charmander gained 1 level
gym 2

after;

gym 3:

after:

gym 4:

 

i managed to forget to screenshot both before and after, but it was also streamed on twitch.
gyarados hit lv42 and charizard was 47-48 before and after

gym 5:

this is the after pic, nothing changed from before the gym

 

gym 6:

also only the after pic, nothing changed from before again (i clicked dragon dance 4 times and won wow!)

 

gym 7:

after pic again, no change between battles

 

gym 8:

nothing changes between this and after but i wanted to point out that you dont gain exp from this fight:

e4:

after e4:

Kanto Feedback:
As many have pointed out already, exp falls off SUPER hard between gym 5 and 6, if you are training more than 3 pokemon at this point, i would probably call it borderline unplayable. There needs to be some sort of way to grind well past this point, and im super concerned for late game grinding. (getting pokemon to lv100 for pvp) I would hope that measures are taken to ensure that grinding in late game is made to be similar in "difficulty" as it is now.
Early game was fantastic and i would say it needs almost no changes, it was really refreshing to play through PRO without having to use a base stage pokemon due to evolving destroying your exp gain.

[Shenzi]

Hello,

I just finished kanto region

 

Intro:

At the beginning of the run i wanted to do at least three regions. during the run i changed my mind to only kanto and johto because it was like a horror movie. But at the e4 of kanto... i was happy to finish just this one region as it was REALY annoying and im not the only one thinking like that.

Sadly i forgot some of the screenshots or made them to late.

 

Gyms:

I did take bulbasaur as starter and had pretty big problems lvl-ing above 15 so the first trainers were extremly difficult. After i finished the second badge i got enough lvl from trainers and gym stuff, so i was able to run through story without lvl-ing until i got to the 6. badge. As Bulbasaur is in type-disadvantage i lvlt my gyarados to 45 for dragon dance and finished of everything with crunch. i actualy dont know anymore how i have beaten the 7. badge <.<, but for the 8. badge i used the good old method with paralize and leech seed in combination of a low-lvled sturdy mon to get invincibility. 

 

E4:

Compared to the old exp system where you were like lvl 80-90 if you arrived at the e4, this time i was like lvl 60 literely soloing it with venusaur... the lvl-ing takes way more time.

I still know the times were you lost money and had a 24hour cooldown after you lost against them so i think this is a HUGE improvement from  back then to now, but as its like 6 years since i did story for the last time i dont know how long its like this XD.

After all the E4 are WAY easier since back then as you can farm exp and try it infinit times but with the new exp system it was very hard and took huge ammount of time and nerves.

 

New EXP System:

in Summary i think the new exp system is WAY worse then before. Farming exp takes WAY more time and is extremely hard as you cant fight mons below you lvl, so its litererly impossible to train if you had to choose a new mon for the gymleader or something alike. If the changes are made for NEW players which DONT KNOW anything from this game, this is a back step espacialy as it also affect all other players which are lvl-ing theyer mons too 100. It would be impossible if theres no new spot, as cerulean cave would be far to low lvl so it would literely take years to get one to 100.

 

New EXP Share:

I do like the new EXP share very much. It makes lvl-ing a new mon in exp share much easier if they are too low to battle by theyre own. I do also like the new EXP share item. No complaints at this system. Which i like the most is that the shared mon have theyre exp calculated by its own lvl, its very cool.

 

About the Test itself:

for me personaly 1 week is way to short, 2 weeks would be better. Well yes there are people who finish all 4 regions in like 1.5 to 2 days but they do know all the little secrets and how to finish the stuff espacialy fast. a new player wont know anything of this and will have way more problems. I think the way i played (and i do know some tips and tricks and still had problems) are way closer to the "new player" this test was aiming for.

Also a surf mount would be pretty cool.

 

Summary:

I dont like the new exp system and i think it will make the story for new player just even harder, so i think staying at the old system is the better choice. Also because it does NOT give any advantage in evolving the mons earlier and it can be cleared easily only with base mons until you arrive at the e4. But i do like the new exp share systeme and the exp share item, thats top.

I have some suggestions what could be implemented in the game to make it more "new player"-friendly as this is the plan of this test.

 

Suggestions:

1.

A more obvious explanation of how exp work and that the evolving system do let them take more time to lvl up. If they dont read it or decide to evolve them early in the game its theyre own choice. Or fault if they skip it.

2.

to give new player a jump start the starter given by the profesor could be from a different OT for the 50% exp boost for a traded mon. this would also make sense since its (obviously) caught from the professor (or at least from the lab).

 

Outro:

It was realy hard to finish kanto and it was a real pain to get it done with this exp system. So i hope this post helps you choose the best for the game.

Im realy sorry that i forgot all these screenshots and hope i still get my reward.

[Karyoplasma]

Link to Johto post

 

Hoenn playthrough screenshots:

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Gym 1 - Rustboro City

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before:

 

after:

 

Gym 2 - Dewford Town

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before:

 

after:

 

Gym 3 - Mauville City

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before:

 

after:

 

Gym 4 - Lavaridge Town

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before:

 

after:

 

Gym 5 - Petalburg City

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after:

 

Gym 6 - Fortree City

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before:

 

after:

 

Gym 7 - Mossdeep City

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before:

 

after:

 

Gym 8 - Soothopolis

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before:

 

after:

 

Pic from after finishing Sinnoh entry quest:

 

 

Thoughts:

Hoenn story was fine. Being able to evolve makes Winona in Fortree City less of a ridiculous difficulty spike, but it's still by far the hardest gym for where it's at in the story. I also struggled with Mossdeep, but that was my own fault since I pretty much just beelined there after the Aqua&Magma quest and didn't fight the optional trainers on the water routes. I did full-clear all the hideouts and then just wanted to progress, it's a very long stretch of the story, so I got a bit antsy I guess.

After finishing the Soothopolis gym, I farmed a Clefairy with the Bold sync Natu I caught early on in Kanto and then trained it for the Sinnoh entry quest. Here, I have a couple of suggestions: make the EV Wald Safari area available to be visited in all regions. You cannot catch anything there anymore and there is no PC, so it being locked to Kanto makes no sense at all. Also add a quest for a non-Wailmer Surf Mount somewhere around Lilycove similar to the Arcanine mount quest in Kanto. You will have to surf a lot after that point and the regular surf speed is just ugh.

 

After training came the most cancerous part: leveling 6 mons to lvl80 to be able to access Sinnoh. This was hell. I farmed the Hoenn E4 over and over and over. I didn't count how many runs it took. The wilds in Hoenn Victory Road are simply not high level enough to matter anymore EXP-wise, the trainers there were a decent source of levels tho.

The EXP Share was of course very helpful with this task, but leveling takes too long. It's so grindy and bad that people hunt and level Nincada, so they can delay evolution until 80 and then get 2 mons for the price of one, just to fulfill the requirement. I'll say it again: the EXP gained is too little, it will drive away many players.

The fights to enter Sinnoh themselves are fine. I did have a really good Masquerain tho (Calm 25+ in relevant IVs), so I could just quiverpass +6 onto Clefable and sweep Charon.

 

Summarizing, I would say that the story part of Hoenn was the smoothest of the 3 regions I've played so farm in terms of EXP progression, just the part after the story was ridiculously grindy.

 

 

[Carry]

hello and I too have decided to finish kanto after a long time..

I wanted to finish kanto and johto at the beginning, but after the third badge it became incredibly difficult and I decided to finish only kanto

This new experience system takes the game to a new level of difficulty and made me despair of many passages in the game

the first badge l was quite easy because i chose bulbasaur

before

after

the second badge was also easy to solve because i had pikachu and bulbasaur in my possession

i forget totake a screenshot befor the gym

after 

3badge before

after

before 4 badge

after

forget to make a screenshot before 5 badge 

after 5 badge

 

before 6

after 6 badge

 

before 7

 

after the 7th badge

 

before 8 

 

after the last badge.. i use only magnemite and use over 30 soda pops until i win.. 

 

now cames the liga.. before i enterand over 10hours training i beat it 

 

The experience system is a horror but EXP share is really good for getting monsters to a higher combat level quickly .

but if that the future of PRO i think new player quit the game faster than before .

 

I hope I get the reward even if I forgot a picture or two ... because that was anything but pleasant 

[Jpasrv]

before hoenn e4--

gyaradose=lvl100,swampert=lvl 87,feraligator=lvl80,clefable=lvl76,ninjask=lvl71,shedinja=lvl71

 

after hoenn e4^^

 

feedback=

                 both jhoto and hoenn were far easy then kanto , but the exp gain from trainer battle is very low ,for eg -i have to repeat e4 7-8 times to do my clefable till lvl 81,and i m quitting sinnoh cause i dont have time to grind my pokemon till lvl 80 for sinnoh quest.

 exp share =

                  only for low lvl pokemon and at early stages like ,2-3 gym . after that ,exp share becomes useless. i recommend to increase exp gain from exp share

        

     in my opinion sinnoh entry quest should be removed like youngster joey boss has been removed .

bugs and errors=

                          1) happiness bug-

                                                      like i told before , after my charizard's happiness became 0 it wont gain any happiness from wild battles   and trainer battles.

                           2)pokemon switch bug-

                                                       sometimes ,after switching a pokemon , either fainted pokemon comes out or other pokemon then choosen one ,comes out

                           3 ) 0 exp gain-

                                                      this happened to me only 1 time in a trainer battle, i ones gained no exp from  a high level gyaradose

                           4) lags-

                                                       game sometimes lag ,even i maxed my fps

                           5) exp bar-

                                                       exp bar always moves backward when my pokemon gain exp

         i hope y'all will fix these bugs and problems .btw there were also many pros .like - low exp need even we evolve a pokemon ( this surely helps a lot ), high level trainer battles etc, removal of youngster joey boss to acess hoenn etc.

 

 

 

                         anyway guys gl to all of u , the test was fun cya y'all in next test

 

[Karyoplasma]

Link to Hoenn post

 

Sinnoh playthrough screenshots:

 

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Gym 1 - Oreburgh City

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before:

 

after:

 

Note: I took the screenshot too late (after the first gym trainer). Staravia was level 14 and Chimchar at around 20% of level 15.

 

Gym 2 - Eterna City

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before:

 

after:

 

 

Gym 3 - Veilstone City

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before:

 

after:

 

Gym 4 - Pastoria City

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before:

 

after:

 

Gym 5 - Hearthome City

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before:

 

after:

 

Gym 6 - Canalave City

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before:

 

after:

 

Gym 7 - Snowpoint City

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before:

 

after:

 

Gym 8 - Sunyshore City

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before:

 

after:

 

After Elite 4:

 

Thoughts:

I used the EXP Share throughout the whole region sharing experience between Chimchar and Starly for the whole time. As you may see from the screenshots, it worked well, but at times it was a hassle to keep switching the item from one poke to the other. As a sidenote here, starter RNG is dumb, I got -Speed nature in 3 out of 4 regions, almost wanting to abandon my starters every time. There should be an option to "reroll" your starter into a neutral nature, 11-19 in all IVs pokemon before getting the first badge, so you won't be sad if you get a crippling nature on your starter.

The region's difficulty was alright if you only use 2 pokemon. I fought every trainer on every route and felt on level for the most part up until the Byron gym, where the difficulty spiked a bit. I would have maybe wished to be a couple levels higher at some points like the Cyrus fight in Distortion World. Also the Giratina fight afterwards did not reward me with any XP, not sure if that is a bug or not. The legendary fights in Hoenn and Sinnoh are ridiculously difficult to the point that you pretty much have to cheese them unless you want to kill wilds for hours to end. You will be outsped and oneshot otherwise and it's a potential road block if you don't have Sturdy statusers.

 

At around high in the level 40s, you can really feel the experience gain to drop off and every level after that is a struggle. I really fear having to level a pokemon, nevermind a full team, to 100 for PvP or bosses. After almost 62 hours and 4 regions, I still did not have a single lvl 100. Granted I still have like 30 rare candies because I deliberately did not use them, but Rare Candies shouldn't be a necessity to reach 100, they should complement it by skipping the most brutal part of the last couple levels. I don't really see a way to get my pokemon to 100 now that I cannot farm the E4s anymore, there are no good leveling options. Maybe Ceru Cave is alright, I don't know because I cannot access it and won't be catching 240 pokemon to unlock it.

 

Summarizing pros and cons that I noted during my playthrough:

+

EXP Share does what it's supposed to do, no complaints here

Not being utterly punished for evolving your pokemon feels way more natural than on live

Catch experience makes the beginning of the region smooth

Getting EV training with the EXP share is helpful, but should be a toggle feature

 

-

Experience gain after high level 40 is way too slow

It's not viable to run more than 2 pokemon in your team during a region's story

Sturdy toxic/para/rock tomb is required for some parts

No good leveling option other than spamming Elite 4

 

Edited September 26, 2022 by Karyoplasma

[Rahkeesh]

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Kanto

 

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Johto

 

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Ended up having to grind some more in DD to beat Clair, first two pictures are the experience before and after first attempt, when I stopped gaining exp from fighting.

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Hoenn

 

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Sinnoh

 

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Some Sinnoh E4 Level 96 Butterfree experience info, no exp share used

 

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As I'm sure you've heard from many people now, the experience change is quite nice early on.  That however changes drastically at the later stages as depicted in my sinnoh elite four pictures, without using an exp share a level 96 Butterfree needed to sweep 3 entire teams to get a single level.

 

In this playthrough I used the experience share in every region besides Johto, but only sharing experience between 2 particular pokemon throughout the entire region.  Butterfree and Venomoth for Kanto, Gengar solo primarily in Johto, Swampert and Chatot in Hoenn, Infernape and Staraptor in Sinnoh.  Focusing only on two pokemon made the time and effort bearable for me, though I do think it would've been a simpler run through of all regions foregoing the exp share and prioritizing one pokemon as a carry.  The only places I felt I had any issues at were Blackthorn in Johto, mainly because dragon tail is annoying as hell, and Fortree in Hoenn because of the second pokemon I chose to train.

 

I noticed others struggling very early on though, particularly versus Janine in Fuchsia and Sabrina in Saffron.  However, I chopped this up to those people choosing Bulbasaur and solely relying on their eventual Venusaurs.  Lots of people relied on Magnemites and leech seed strategies for Giovanni's Mewtwo, Geodude/Onix toxic for Deoxys and Giratina.  Newer players definitely won't have as much information as we do obviously, so I could see people trying to level up 2 or more pokemon via exp share and hitting a hard road block in these instances due to severely outmatched and outleveled pokemon.  Also doesn't help that Hoenn makes you fight through Mt. Pyre's gauntlet and doesn't yield any experience and doesn't let you leave to heal, which can also be difficult for newer/not as knowledgeable players.

 

All of this being said, I also never used any of the rare candies I got from pokestops, digsites, and natural spawns, so using those could've definitely helped me overcome some of the hurdles I ran into.  I loved the upgrade to early level experience gain, especially for completing the exp boost quest in Viridian.  The change in earlygame exp yield made getting to Cerulean with 2 decently leveled pokemon a much better time for me, and up to that point has always been the most dreaded part of my previous walkthroughs of the game.

 

I've done testing on two accounts, my main which I completed Sinnoh on and my alt which I've completed Hoenn on - I'll post/edit the alternate screenshots later.  My main points of criticism are similar to everyone else's, what seemed to be a huge downgrade in experience gain at later stages of each region, usually between the 6th to 8th gyms from what I could tell.  Giving the trainers in these areas a higher increase would make things go smoother I believe for others.  Also should you end up completing the elite four, you're screwed for any consistently "high" experience gain until the next region's elite four.  While I could see having them be perpetually repeatable be an issue, perhaps allowing the rechallenging of them for new players via some condition, i.e. should you beat them and wish to fight them further, you can only fight them provided your party consists of only pokemon your OT has caught, and the experience gained from them after becoming champion be nerfed slightly from what they originally yielded.  Also unallowing this after they've actually entered the next region to prevent it being the new meta of leveling self-caught pokemon.  This could prevent daycare services from abusing it and still provide newer players an avenue of experience grinding should they still need it for any pokemon they wish to use later down the line they might've caught while playing the story.  Any questions you might have feel free to ask them, doing this twice has definitely netted me some info on it.

 

Second account playthrough Kanto - Hoenn

 

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Kanto

 

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Johto

 

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Hoenn

 

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Edited September 26, 2022 by Rahkeesh

[GoldenP1kachu]

Johto Completed
 

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1st Gym



2nd Gym


3rd Gym


4th Gym


5th Gym


6th Gym


7th Gym



8th Gym


E4


 

Johto Feedback:
I found Johto  much easier to complete than Kanto.
Once again the EXP Share helps a lot to lv 40-45 for pokes to get trained.

A few Bugs with the ice skating part but it didn't really prevent me from doing what was supposed to be done.

Once again i would heavily suggest for the later stage grind to have an increased EXP drop from wild pokemons. 
Very similar to the Kanto end experience.

E4 was pretty easy to beat the second i got myself a bold MG Clefable that could set up.


Hoenn Completed:
 

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1st Gym


2nd Gym


3rd Gym


4th Gym


5th Gym

Failed to beat everything so no EXP made from this Gym xD
6th Gym


7th Gym

8th Gym


After E4

Hoenn Feedback:
Hoenn was a bit different to many other Regions. At least for me.
I had a hard time beating a lot of the trainers that was around and lost a lot of money because of that.

Deoxys!! I put all my cards into beating Deoxys with the Toxic & Healing tactic but Toxic did not spawn where it was supposed to do.
I had to cahnge tactic and I went for 4 Onix with Rock Tomb just to kill deoxys with Swampert & Gyarados.

I found the end of Hoenn Region pretty hard tbh.

I liked the fact that we didn't need to get Rattata to 80 so that we could jump straight into Hoenn.
But after completing Hoenn i decided to end my Public Test from this account and wanted to try 2 regions on 2nd account with EXP boost instead. 
This will be posted from that account later on.


Thanks for giving us the chance of testing this. I find it as a very smart move to let the community get a chance to help collect data and make input on how we experienced it. Before a final decision is made around what we are testing.

I am looking forward to future public tests like this one.

Kind Regards, GP

[Erasmoreisinho]

Gin8 

 

[Puppyhun]

LINK TO MY KANTO POST

 

JOHTO

 

VIOLET GYM

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AZALEA GYM

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GOLDENROD GYM

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ECRUTEAK GYM

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CIANWOOD GYM

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OLIVINE GYM

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MAHOGANY GYM

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BLACKTHORN GYM

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It took me longer on Johto since I've EV trained my starter and all of the pokes that I've caught when I reached Violet City. I thought it was gonna be a breeze since my pokes were EV trained but I did struggle a bit with Jasmine and a lot with Clair. I had to resort to some strategies since my pokes being EV trained were not enough. The gym leader's pokes were tougher than your usual NPCs, I was thinking of just grinding and overleveling my feraligatr but the only route with high level pokes available at that moment was the route below Blackthorn and it would take me so much time, so I just caught a phanpy and snubbull to kinda counter the gym leader's first poke. So I agree with other's suggestions to increase the EXP drop of the pokemons in the latter part of the game. I think I will end my test with Johto since I won't have time for Hoenn and SInnoh.