Public Test: Exp. Rework

Wakuki · September 26, 2022

Kanto Finished & reviewed.

Spoiler

Gym battles 1-8

1st Gym

2nd Gym

3rd Gym

Rocket Hideout in Celadon

4th Gym
Took Screenshott but forgot to save it ....
5th Gym

6th Gym

7th Gym

8th Gym

Champ

Kanto Experience & Feeback
I have done this test story before without EXP Boost and decided to do it with EXP Boost this time.

First of all the difference the 25% boost gives is very good for the late story.
Those 6-7 levels more that you got with the 25% showed to be very helpful.

EXP. Share:
A very good feature to level low level pokes but doesn't really help when you come across the time where the poke need to much EXP to lvl. Is 85 is the new 100?
If Mid-Late EXP would be fixed so that we could grind more EXP I am sure everything would be perfect!

Johto Finished & reviewed

Spoiler

Sprout Tower

1st Gym

2nd Gym

Before Goldenrod Underground Basement

3rd Gym

4th Gym

5th Gym

6th Gym

7th Gym

8th Gym

Johto Feedback

Johto, Johto & Johto.
What a lovely region to experience with the EXP Boost.
Exception when i used the magnemites for last gym to set up an agility and swords dance on feraligatr he completely solo'd the whole region.
Which is a contrary to what I had to experience with my main.
The EXP Share was good to use for a little while on Magikarp but i fast aknowledge that Feraligatr will take down the whole region by itself.

I didn't experience the same amount of bugs that I did on my main account. Probably fixed before i went to Johto.

My biggest feedback after finishing 2 regions would probably be these:
- EXP Share worked until lvl 40ish. So a good thing if the EXP dropped by Wild pokes would increase from mid to late game.
- EXP Boost gives much more so that you are more ready for mid/late game.

I like the Idea of changing the current PRO servers to add the EXP Share.
Only thing I really would love to see would be the dropped EXP from wild pokes. It needs to be increased or lvl 100 will be almost impossible to reach.

Thank you for the oppurtunity to test this EXP Test and EXP Share.

Nechrit · September 26, 2022

Kanto

Kanto was not too bad initially, up until vermilion. The only problematic level difference was right after the Rock Tunnel, where those trainers clearly had different level tuning.

Then Team Rocket got into play - truly traumatic experience. In order to not fall behind in levels, I had to drop EXP Share and focus on a single pokemon: Gyarados. Of course, every pokemon has a electr or rock move. The overabundance of Magne*** that were outlevelling and outspeeding me made it truly a hassle. Level another pokemon to deal with them? Takes WAY too long, as you no longer have access to trainers XP.

You know what they say: if you can't beat them, join them. I cheesed my way through the rest of the gyms with clever tactics (magnemites xD) and lost a lot of braincells relying on Ice Fang and Aqua Tail rng to sweep. It worked. Was it fun? Not exactly.

After beating the gyms, it was time for the E4; but before then....RED! I'm a veteran player and my team just made Mega Mewtwo look like a Rattata, what can go wrong right? Right? Well, I actually took down the Mega Charizard X before succumbing to the other mons (note: please make sure new players dont lose money on that fight!! It feels so bad to lose an unwinnable matchup and see your hard generated money drop). Still, pretty happy I took that beast down.

So yeah, Mega Mewtwo down. Mega Char X down. I'm ready for E4! Nope. Victory Road is just so insanely overtuned for this XP curve that it is legit impossible without god knows how many hours of grinding or weird cheesing mechanics. The first trainer had a level 66 Raichu. Note, highest level was a 55 Gyarados, with other mons being much lower level. I resorted to sacrifice my money and surrender most of the battles.

E4 was doable by cheesing double Intimidate, Sturdy Stealth Rocks, Sturdy Twave and Strudy Light Screen (with clay).

Question of the century: would a new player be able to have a good experience? Oh god no. It would be absolutely terrible and drive them away before they get to Cinnabar.

Johto

Johto felt much easier at first. At lower level I was gaining much more experience than I did in Kanto, so much that I managed to keep 2 pokes somewhat in line. It was a pretty easy sail through, little exception to the problematic Lapras in Slowpoke Well.

Game continued to be fairly simple given my experience, and I did not need to overly rely on silly tactics. It felt harder than I remember it being 6 years ago, but not impossible.

That held true until right after Ecruteak Gym. On my way to Olivine, trainers seemed to have a 10-15 level advantage over my entire team. Had to surrender to many. On the way to Cianwood, things seemed to turn less problematic. Cianwood and Olivine gyms were a true struggle. Partially because semi-immune to cheesing mechanics, partially because I had no decent moves (more on that later $$$), in great deal because there was no way I could reliably level a growlithe or something "on the go" without sacrificing tons of hours killing lvl 15-20 pokemons, or dealing with lvl 35 tentacruels/lanturns/mantines that oneshot it.

So yeah, I picked my fishing rod and went back to the Gyarados strat. Painfully levelled to 42, googled where to find 3x hidden Rare Candies and got to 45 for Dragon Dance. Game became much easier. Rocket hideout in Mahogany wasnt too bad this time. Trainers north of the city were insanely tough and higher level than me, although only 5-7. Gym was easy.

I arrived to Blackthorn and cheesed my way to snap a win abusing intimidate rotations and Ice Fang rng.

Question of the century: would a new player be able to have a good experience? Again, nope. This time I found that the wild pokemon levels were absolutely NOT in line with trainers/gym required levels. If you want to build diversity in your team, you have to resort to catching one of the lvl 20-30 pokemons and hardgrind it to 50 to "properly" deal with the later gyms. Given that the majority of the wild pokes to train on are level 35 max, it's a VERY tedious and long process.

Conclusion

First things first - the test clearly showed that you need to be a truly experienced player to deal with the proposed change. Massive tuning is required in the points I mentioned, as well as overall XP gain to ensure new players can build "the team of their dreams" while completing this fantastic storyline. It really sucks dumping all your XP and resources into a single pokemon when there is so much variety! Also, consider the possibility of Trainers you lose to (especially Gym leaders!) to still grant you XP even if you lose/surrender once. Its unlikely any new player oneshots it - not granting them the XP upon success really hinders their progress and feeling of achievement.

Secondly, I struggled with money. Like, ALOT. Johto would have been much easier if I could afford an extra EQ TM and Sword Dance tutor. For the effort it takes, plus several surrenders required, consumables etc, you should really get out of the main story with a few hundred thousands in your poket, if perhaps not even more. It's a once-per-account experience, new players should not be feeling like they cant teach their pokemon a cool move because it prevents them from buying 2 revives.

Afraid of this being abused? With the time it took, even cheesing it, it would REALLY not be worth the hassle. If they do? Well good on them, I guess. Altiernatively, make every tutor free for a single time while NOT being region champion.

Last not least, I was NEVER so scared of bug catchers and random trainers before. They were the MVP of this runthrough - MUCH harder than any gym or even the Elite4.

That's all! I hope that helps. Wish me luck on my 2x IV locked reroll, I can really use some!

Cheers,

Nechrit

Spoiler

Edited September 26, 2022 by Nechrit

Bagadzilla · September 26, 2022

Kanto:

Gyms:

1st

Spoiler

2nd:

Spoiler

3rd:

Spoiler

4th:

Spoiler

5th:

Spoiler

6th:

Spoiler

7th:

Spoiler

8th:

Spoiler

Kanto feedback:

I really appreciate the experience system. It makes more sense if you need to work hard to get to the end of the story. Afterall, it makes it more fun for people that they appreciate story. You need to think mechanics how to defeat the gyms and staff like this. Before this experience system, you just had one pokemon and you could destroy anything whatever you were clicking. Also, I really liked the new item (experience share), it provides us the opportunity to lvl up two pokes at the same time. The fact that this item provides with more exp the lower level pokemon is also really nice, as that helps us to have similar levels between our favorite pokes in the long run. In otherwords, that allows to proceed to the story and then go back any time, catch a really low level poke and train it fast to catch up with the rest of the roster.

Nm3 · September 26, 2022

Kanto

Spoiler

1st Gym

2nd Gym

3rd Gym

4th Gym

5th Gym

6th Gym

7th Gym

8th Gym

Before/After (No fights after 7th gym before fighting gio)

E4

Before

After

Kanto Thoughts:

Exp seems really REALLY bad in mid-late game. Sure you can evo mons, but I feel like especially later, its going to feel so bad to level mons without candy. Evo mons are technically faster to level up but I feel that levelling 1st stage pokemon in the past was just easier.

Something I wasn't aware about was the exp boost you can pick up in viridian. I think this would've made a huge difference for getting through the game, but assuming a new player doesn't know about this, they're going to get screwed over long term, especially during hoenn. Overall I think the update did its job of helping out new players get through the first few gyms, but in the long term, it will make it harder to progress in late game without changes to wild spawn exp.

Johto

Spoiler

(Sorry no SS until 2nd gym)

1st gym:

Before:

Quilava Lv16

Geodude Lv7

After:

Quilava Lv 17

Geodue Lv7

2nd Gym:

Before:

Quilava Lv 27

Geodude Lv 7

Gastly Lv13

Mareep Lv 8

After

3rd Gym:

Before/After (NO xp had to redo gym)

4th Gym:

5th Gym:

6th Gym:

7th Gym

Before/After

8th Gym

Before

After

E4

Johto thoughts:

Exp problem was worse here than in Kanto, Pokestops not giving out candies until 8th badge meant less levels. Power level of gyms here was way higher than kanto, which didnt help, and there was less trainer density compared to kanto. Unless you are funneling every point of exp into one pokemon, its going to be difficult to get through gyms, which is what I decided to do for future regions, unless I needed a 2nd mon to help progress through a certain gym. The exp share helps in the early game, but using it later is detrimental because you cant afford to be splitting exp between mons late game, or else your team is unable to outspeed, let alone damage the gym leaders pokemon. I had to resort to toxic stalling with a geodude just because my team was so under levelled compared to the leaders for gym 8, and the starters are so much worse compared to the rest of the regions.

Repating Johto Elite 4 gave decent experience, but I had to repeat it so many times until I was in decent shape to run through the e4. I think adding more trainers would be a benefit if the system for exp will be implemented this way.

Hoenn

Spoiler

1st Gym

2nd Gym

3rd Gym

4th Gym

5th Gym

6th Gym

7th Gym

8th Gym

(Screenshots got corrupted sorry, Swampert was at lvl 77 and manectric at 72)

E4

Final Thoughts:

There's too many npcs that don't give exp. Mt pyre is the biggest offender (Why does this gauntlet still exist its just a useless time sink) and admins from the weather institute + every battle with Jackson. Thankfully you can train a bit better in this region because its larger and has more trainers, but trying to raise more than 2 Pokémon is going to be impossible, because wild encounters don't give any exp mid game. I had to do the e4 100+ times just to meet the requirements to get into sinnoh.

Sinnoh

Spoiler

1st Gym

2nd Gym

3rd Gym

4th Gym

5th Gym

Before/After (Had to restart due to dc)

6th Gym

Before

After

7th Gym

Before

After

8th Gym

Before

After

Shop for sunnyshore is also bugged:

E4

By far the easiest region, theres many trainers and very few fights that dont give exp. It helped that this time I only used one pokemon so I had a mon that could beat all the gyms reliably instead of 3/4 mons unable to damage a gym leader at all because they are to slow/frail. I ended up just soloing the whole game with an infernape using toxic sturdy stall to beat the things ape couldnt like gira. Overall I would say this was a better run than the other regions but I still would appreciate more exp so I could use other team members.

Final Thoughts:

I think that overall, the changes did it's job to help the early parts of each region not feel like a huge pain, and reduce the punishment new players face for evolving their pokemon too early. Now you can evovle whenever you want, and it give usually unviable pokemon for story in current time (early route bugs/birds, certain stone evolution Pokémon) a purpose for being trained.

The problem I'm finding with each region is that it is very difficult to manage a team with more than 1 permanent member, let alone 2. There is just not enough exp to be handed out to party members and it doesn't help that the wild exp mid-late game is extremely low, and rematches with trainers are locked to 1 whole week. Using Pokémon in EXP groups outside of fast/medium fast are just going to put you behind.

If this exp system is going to implemented the way it is, trainer rematch cooldowns need to be reconsidered, and wild spawn exp also needs to be looked at carefully. Otherwise I think this is going to have a detrimental long term effect on the playerbase. Glad I got the time and opportunity to play this beta and I hope that my and everyone's else's feedback is considered.

Edited September 26, 2022 by Nm3

Jilan · September 26, 2022

I/ KANTO

Spoiler

1)

2)

3)

4)

5)

6)

7)

8 )

II/ JOHTO

Spoiler

1)

2)

3)

4)

5)

6)

7)

8 )

III/ Feedback

Spoiler

Kanto & Johto done without exp boost nor being membership

Exp share : good addition, it's nice for a new player to be able to lvl up (end ev train) multiples pokemons at once

Early game is chill but late game is kinda tricky and to up your team (at least 6 poke lvl 100) should require a lot of grinding and countless amount of time

you can see where i had to grind on the screenshots by looking at the time gap between both screenshots for the same gym

quick note on Johto, the amount of exp given by wilds pokemon (or their lvl) is absolutely horrific until dragon den, makes it harder to grind before that

Edited September 26, 2022 by Jilan

Lilybean · September 27, 2022

Spoiler

Kanto

Gym 1

Gym 2

Gym 3

Gym 4

Gym 5

Gym 6

Gym 7

Gym 8

Kanto Review:

Kanto started off feeling amazing. The first few gyms felt really good, the exp was great and it was a lot easier to get through using evolved pokemon. However as time went on, exp started to really drag. I started struggling once we got to around the 4th gym, because I didn't really want to grind, I just wanted to play through as a player used to normal pokemon games would. So most of the way I went for strong pokemon, and got lucky with the stats on a couple. However once I got to the 5th gym, I couldn't beat it. I actually had to grind out about 11 levels between all of my pokemon before I could beat the gym leader. The same thing happened with the 7th gym, and by the 8th I had to rely completely on cheese (paralyzing with snorlax so my pokemon would go first)

Ultimately it was good in the beginning, but it was very discouraging as time went on. EXP from trainers felt fine, but grinding out fighting wild pokemon felt impossible. Even in cinnabar mansion it was little to no exp, so once all of the trainers have been beaten it doesn't feel very good to grind. Ultimately I would have hated if that kind of grinding was required to get my pokemon to 100 for endgame. Even getting enough exp to beat the elite four feels like it's going to be a hard task (though I'm still going to try) because I ended up so underleveled and weak. It did take me about 19 hours to get through all of the gyms playing very casually when I had free time.

The exp share did feel amazing though. It made it no longer feel like a punishment to pick up a pokemon halfway through your run. EXP share pokemon easily caught up to and stayed caught up with the others, so doing something like deciding when I failed the 5th gym to level my snorlax was a breeze. I was able to get him up to speed very quickly. If this was brought to the game, I would definitely be a lot happier with trying to level new pokemon.

TL;DR Early game was fun, late game was frustrating and grindy.

Kahrizz · September 27, 2022

Spoiler

Kanto

Gym 1

Gym 2

Gym 3

Gym 4

Gym 5

Gym 6

Gym 7

Gym 8

initially the exp rework felt very satisfying, allowing me to evolve my pokemon early on felt great due to the power spike that it provides, and i didnt feel too obligated to grind too much, as long as i fought all the trainers that i could. However around the 5th or 6th gyms as my pokemon had already been evolved for some time, it felt pretty like pretty standard PRO stuff, i wasnt overleveled at all, but i had grinded for pokemon with good IVs so they still preformed well. However by the 7th gym, i felt quite underleveled and underpowered, which was to be expected, however the exp i was reciving from wild battles felt as though they had slowed to an absolute crawl, i mean i was getting around 400~xp per battle in cinnabar mansion when 1 level requires 9k+ so it was absolutely gruesome to slog through in order to comfortably defeat the 7th & 8th gyms, opting for a use of excess items and "cheese" strategies like spamming body slam/resetting giovanni's mewtwo in order to paralyze him and even then i struggled to outspeed it, and had to rely on them being fully paralyzed. I feel that the main reason that i had been able to get through kanto was because of my experience with pokemon, i had attempted to curate a team specifically for getting through the region as quickly as possible(im no expert, im sure there were tons of better strategies but still i tried my best lol), but it still took me 20+ hours to muddle through the gyms alone, not even attempting the e4..

the exp share however i think was an amazing addition, being able to catch a weak pokemon such as magikarp or eevee up to speed is amazing; especially now that evolving them is viable for the story. the addition of the pokemon receiving the exp from the share also getting EVs is great too, no complaints here at all.

P.S. my pikachus hold a light ball so dont @me lol

TL;DR: the exp rework feels amazing in the early game, and quite bad in the later portions.

Leoreece · September 27, 2022

Introduction/Feedback

First off, id like to say that the idea of playing through the story again with a few restrictions and some potentially positive changes to experience gains was something that really appealed to me. Even the original series has the player struggle with the choice of raising one or two really strong pokemon, or dividing the available experience between 6 Pokemon ~inevitably making the whole team weaker without further time investment for "grinding."

With that in mind, I came into this test planning to play the game as I imagine it was intended. A full team of reasonably leveled pokemon.

So I set off with hopeful expectations and a not entirely useless bulbasaur. Progress up to and including the first two Gyms was relatively painless and the hope of raising a full team of 6 pokemon for my journey was still alive. I picked up my experience share in vermillion, and despite my misunderstanding, (thought it was team share) it was a welcome addition and helped me raise the levels of some of my more "passive" pokemon. The SS Anne/Third Gym seemed more challenging than I remembered due to higher level pokemon than I was prepared for, but was still manageable without having to divert from the main story to train for too long.

It was towards the 4th Gym battle however that the disparity in level between my opponents pokemon and my own became more apparent. Despite my best efforts, it was no longer practical to maintain a full team of active pokemon as it was becoming increasingly difficuilt to keep up with the level creep.

With my hopes dashed, I had to decide which pokemon to feed the "limited" available experience from trainers, and neglect most of the others.

Fuschia was the last gym I bothered using various pokemon,. After that I came to the same conclusion as many others on the test server. Abuse gyarados or similar pokemon with boosting moves, and cheese the bosses with status moves and ability mechanics.

By the time I made it to the E4 I was still somewhat under leveled in comparison to what I was up against, Even after abandoning my team for one pokemon.

TLDR

Conclusion: The early game was decent but im not sure that had a whole lot to do with the exp share.

Mid - Late game was painful. Without abusing game mechanics and using boss battle strategies, I wouldnt have had a chance. The experience gained isnt nearly enough, in particular experience gained from wild pokemon.

Johto was the same as above but probably worse, possibly due to less trainers? Im not sure.

Hoenn mightve been differnt due to the size of the region = more battles = more experience but I didnt risk it and again predominantly used axew-haxorus dragon dance.

I didnt even attempt to get to Sinnoh because I couldnt think of anything worse than raising 6 different Pokemon to level 80 with these experience rates.

Exp share is a great addition but the exp rate gain needs rebalanced.

Pros

its nice being able to evolve pokemon
experience share is nice
experience gain from catching pokemon is nice

Cons

Nowhere near enough exp late game

Kanto

Edited September 27, 2022 by Leoreece
Feedback

Leoreece · September 27, 2022

Johto

Feedback: The same as Kanto more or less. The early game was decent and having the exp share from the start allowed me to raise a couple of favourites simultaneously. I managed to keep 3 pokemon reasonably leveled up until the 4th Gym where again, I had to give up and just feed all the exp to one pokemon.

It was gyarados + magnet bros/cursed body vs the region again

Pros

its nice being able to evolve pokemon
experience share from the beginning is nice
experience gain from catching pokemon is nice

Cons

Nowhere near enough exp late game

Edited September 27, 2022 by Leoreece
Feedback

Leoreece · September 27, 2022

Hoenn

Feedback: After completing the previous two regions, I was aware of the lack of experience available and so planned my strategy around that. After breezing through the first few gyms, I spent an unhealthy ammount of time searching for the only pokemon id need (besides sturdy boiz) in Hoenn: Axew. With this regions op dragon dancer on board I proceded to blow through the rest of Hoenn without issue. This was the first time ive probably been overlevelled.

This probably isnt inclusive for new players and I shouldnt have to meticulously plan my pathway to ensure a smooth playthrough. Still not enough exp, I didnt dare equip exp share on another pokemon because I wasnt sure there was enough to share.

I didnt even attempt to get to Sinnoh because I couldnt think of anything worse than raising 6 different Pokemon to level 80 with these experience rates.

Despite the issues with exp gain, it was fun coming up with ways to circumvent them.

Pros