Polishing the World Link Series

[SealedDarkness]

Recently I picked up what I understood to be the final copy of Achiya Sanae's work, Touhoumon World Link, Touhoumon Another World and Touhoumon Marisa's Magical World. All three are touhoumon games that, miraculously enough, can link up and trade, and all three feature unique and interesting gameplay changes.

However, I have noticed that  Achiya Sanae appears to be too busy to update anymore, and they all are somewhat unpolished. The text is often unclear, and a lot of the sprites could use an update. Some are even recolours where they could be new sprites. The music is pleasant, however some of it can get grainy at times. Another World allows you to see all of Gensokyo,  but it has many graphical glitches and untranslated text. Marisa's Magic World allows you to catch any touhou at all and doesn't have any kind of plot, which is amazing...But it has a cruel habit of shunting you out of areas once you've caught enough to unlock the next batch, forever preventing you from catching that Shinki you wanted so badly because you got enough to go to the next area.

They are playable. Indeed, they are wonderful in many ways. But I feel that with a little bit of polish, these versions can be so much more.

I will admit, I only have minor experience modding, but I'm picking it up pretty quickly. I'm not a pixel artist either, but I do normal art and can probably work in pixel if some time is given to learn. I can translate the untranslated text, clean up images, and learn really quickly, so I think it can be done.

Here are the glitches and problems I've noticed

Overall:
- Awkward English/Untranslated Romaji
- Old/Bad Sprites, especially on the Dark Touhoumon. (In AW it appears that the creator got about halfway through converting sprites, then stopped. A lot of chibis are in a radically different style than their evolved forms, using sprites from Touhoudex 2, then transitioning to the original style, it seems.)
- Where to go next is not always clear (In noncanon sections, obviously)
-Balancing issues and bad map edits

World Link: (Copied from Achiya's Page)
- Extended trainers sometimes random item (include ball)
- Corrupted Battle Pyramid. Unfixable for now. You can get guts symbol from Grand League.
- Walk permission in some spot. I’m too lazy for checking it.
- Some flags reset.
- Gym Leaders in Kanto are re-used sprites and do not say anything after battle
- A lot of the areas feel very unfinished

Another World:
- Item respawning, can be fixed
- Overworld sprites overlaps other Overworld sprites, I have no idea how to fix it, but, most likely because of behavior in stream table.
- Music stopped, I have no idea, because I only use VBA and DSTwo for testing.
- Trainer re-battles (VS Seeker) aren’t correct, can be fixed but I don’t have exact re-battle list.
- The Magic Woods has misleading text, owing to a removed feature. It says you will die if you do not eat healing mushrooms, however you are never in any danger. Healing and Poison mushrooms can be obtained, but do nothing. However I noticed they sell well and since both Tinymushrooms and Big Mushrooms can be readily obtained, why not just edit the text and have them be sell only items?
- Grainy Music (If possible, I would merely like to clarify the music tracks, however if nothing can be done, perhaps we can find some 8-bit music tracks and use those...?)
Marisa's Magic World:
- As far as I can tell, there is no way to go to areas past the one you have unlocked. It would be nice if it were possible for you to go back and catch ones you missed.

(Any other things noticed/suggested are appreciated.)

Current Roadblocks
- For some reason, my rom will not open in any of the romhackers I know, it simply says it cannot read the file. I don't know if I'm doing it wrong, but I just know that I can't open it in YAPE, Advance Map Editor, Advance Text Editor, or unLZ. I suspect it MAY have something to do with the opening cinematic, but I'm not sure.
- I wish to take sprites from both a version of Touhoumon Blue and from the Touhoudex 2 Spritesheet. The Spritesheet is fine, however I need to know if anyone knows a way I can look at the sprites in Blue and then rip the ones I want? There's a lot of overlap between the two, but also some things that appear to be original.
-I need shiny sprites for all touhoumon. I guess I can go off the sprite colourings from the original sprites, but it would help a lot if it were possible for me to just take the already finished ones and use those.


Is there anyone interested in helping me? Even if it's just something like helping me work through a bug, or providing a resource, I'd be infinitely grateful. I'll be the first to admit this is a fairly ambitious project, but I feel that this is probably the best Touhoumon version I've ever seen and I really do like it.

[Arcorann]

Are you using the unedited header version? If not, you can change the header using a suitable tool (I don't have the info on hand right now) to match one from a clean Emerald/FireRed/Ruby ROM, and the file should then open in whatever tool you're using.

[Starxsword]

Yeah, you need an unedited header. The translation is unpolished because the creator is not a native English speaker, so other people will have to help if they want better sentences.

[SealedDarkness]

Ah, understood. I wasn't aware the creator wasn't a native english speaker- that considered, they pull it off remarkably well. Well, I'll look for a header editor and focus on translating and refining the english in Another World for now.

That said, does anyone know how to script properly? All I want to do is insert a Nitori-bot into MMW so that you can change the areas for capture (barring of course, the ones you've not unlocked yet), but I'm unaware of how that works in the first place. I assume it's some sort of scripting effect, but I'm not entirely sure of the mechanics behind it.

Also, does anyone think that adding a breeding center to MMW would be a bad idea? That would kind of complete it as a sort of "Fill in the dex however you like/Get the touhou with the exact moves you want" completionist game- unless it already has one and I'm spacing out.

[SacredWind]

Old/Bad Sprites, especially on the Dark Touhoumon. (In AW it appears that the creator got about halfway through converting sprites, then stopped. A lot of chibis are in a radically different style than their evolved forms, using sprites from Touhoudex 2, then transitioning to the original style, it seems.)

It's because in Touhoumon 2 (it's called Touhoumon 1.8 ), it's only Chibi --> Normal or Chibi --> Alternate form, while in Aichiyas Series, it's Chibi --> Normal --> Ex (-->Last Word), hence 1.5 style normal form. No idea why he didn't use 1.8s Alternate forms instead of 1.5s normal form.

World Link:
Extended trainers sometimes random item (include ball)

He said he already fixed that i World Link 1.42.

Another World:
Music stopped, I have no idea, because I only use VBA and DSTwo for testing.

That's something wrong with the loop in the music. I don't actually know how to fix that

Marisa's Magic World:
- As far as I can tell, there is no way to go to areas past the one you have unlocked. It would be nice if it were possible for you to go back and catch ones you missed.

You can, but it's just random, which area you go to.

And please, fix that fact, that about after you become Hoenn Champ, Ex forms with about 500 BST become obsolete, and you have to resort to Last Word forms with 700 BST to battle other Last Words and at some point, Zero Forms with BSt higher than Arceus, about 990 BST and Vocaloids with Same BST. You can use Ex forms, but it's gonna be hard.

And i got my gba tools from Aichiya's page, link to all his tools: http://www.mediafire.com/?0b467c4x7r2eabc
i used Advanced Series to rip sprites, both normal, shiny and backsprites, it's really useful. (it's in the link)
About header editing, this should do it: http://www.pokemonpoint.com/tools/rom-header-editor-advance/

That should be what i know, but I would like to help, when of course I have time. i have already sprites for World Link, Touhoumon Blue (the exclusive sprites not from 1.8 ) and Touhou Puppet Play Enhanced (Aichiyas 1.8 port of an unofficial version), and have a little experience with Pokemon hacks ;P.

[heroictype]

Hi! I am Keshi's signficant other, as it happens, and she's asked me to let people know that she's having some major computer problems at the moment. Apparently, something with the power supply... Basically, she can't charge it. And we're still not sure how long it's going to take to get it fixed. However, she wants to have as much ready as possible to resume. I'll be doing the translations of romaji that remains in the game!

One thing she's been doing is actually designing updated sprites  on paper, particularly for some EX and Dark Touhoumon. If possible, some help in actually constructing the sprites once the design is up would be very much appreciated.

And please, fix that fact, that about after you become Hoenn Champ, Ex forms with about 500 BST become obsolete, and you have to resort to Last Word forms with 700 BST to battle other Last Words and at some point, Zero Forms with BSt higher than Arceus, about 990 BST and Vocaloids with Same BST. You can use Ex forms, but it's gonna be hard.

Okay, I'll let her know!

And i got my gba tools from Aichiya's page, link to all his tools: http://www.mediafire.com/?0b467c4x7r2eabc
i used Advanced Series to rip sprites, both normal, shiny and backsprites, it's really useful. (it's in the link)
About header editing, this should do it: http://www.pokemonpoint.com/tools/rom-header-editor-advance/

That link doesn't work anymore, sadly... Though if  it's from Aichiya's page, I suppose he's the one who would need to be contacted about it.  What program specifically did you use for the sprites, though?

You can, but it's just random, which area you go to.

Oh, how do you do it? In any case, I think we might want to make it so you can choose, but it might help to know so we can figure more of this out.

And finally (for the moment), I'm trying to figure out how to get the text editor to work for her. I have what should be an unedited header version of the ROM, but I can't even get the program to open. I get this error: "compnent 'comctl32.ocx' or one of its dependencies not correctly registered: a file is missing or invalid." I've tried several fixes and I even have the file downloaded, but nothing has worked. Any suggestions?

Thanks for any help and for what has already been given!

[EthanSilver]

And finally (for the moment), I'm trying to figure out how to get the text editor to work for her. I have what should be an unedited header version of the ROM, but I can't even get the program to open. I get this error: "compnent 'comctl32.ocx' or one of its dependencies not correctly registered: a file is missing or invalid." I've tried several fixes and I even have the file downloaded, but nothing has worked. Any suggestions?

Downloading a component isn't enough - you also have to register it with Windows. After all, that file could be anywhere on your computer.

1- Copy the ocx control to your system32 folder (c:\windows\system32\ in most cases...).
2- Go to the start menu -> run
3- Type "regsvr32 c:\windows\system32\COMCTL32.OCX" without the quotes (change the path if necessary)
4- A message should pop up indicating the control was registered.

You may have to restart your PC for the changes to take effect. RegSVR32 in Windows 7 is sometimes an annoyance because of securities. If you can't get it running, open cmd.exe and run as administrator, and do it in there.

Remember, five seconds with google is your friend.

[heroictype]

Downloading a component isn't enough - you also have to register it with Windows. After all, that file could be anywhere on your computer.

1- Copy the ocx control to your system32 folder (c:\windows\system32\ in most cases...).
2- Go to the start menu -> run
3- Type "regsvr32 c:\windows\system32\COMCTL32.OCX" without the quotes (change the path if necessary)
4- A message should pop up indicating the control was registered.

You may have to restart your PC for the changes to take effect. RegSVR32 in Windows 7 is sometimes an annoyance because of securities. If you can't get it running, open cmd.exe and run as administrator, and do it in there.

Remember, five seconds with google is your friend.

That's the problem, actually. I have the file in the right place, and I've tried running that. I've also tried some other fixes. None of it has worked, though.  I could very well be doing something wrong, but I've also tried it more than once. I've even done the restart. I was hoping someone might have alternative suggestions, but at this point, it wasn't a very strong hope. Still, thanks for trying!

[EthanSilver]

None of it has worked, though.

What does "none of it has worked" mean, specifically? Do you get an error message when trying to register the component? Does the component appear to register successfully but the application itself still fails to run? Are radioactive squids emerging from your screen and demanding either your life or all of your toenail-clippings?

I'm going to pull some Awesome Programmer Magic and tell you exactly what's going on on your end. Lemme know how I do.

1- You register the file with success after performing the steps I listed. It even tells you everything's all good.
2- You've restarted your computer, probably. Maybe you didn't do this last time you tried, I dunno, my APM only goes so far.
3- You ran the application and got the component missing error.
4- Also, you are running Windows 7 64-bit (this last bit's important).

Assuming I was right, particularly about point 4, put the file in SysWOW64 instead of system32 and repeat the same steps (don't forget to change the path). This won't help with the squids in the least bit (sorry about those btw... please email them back to me if you can), but if the application fails to recognize it after performing these steps successfully, this will do the trick. Failing that I'd give downloading it from a different source a shot - you should be getting an error while trying to register it if that's the case, however. Remember to restart afterwards to ensure the component is properly registered with all currently-running programs.

[heroictype]

Okay, I'll give that a whirl! Thanks!

(Also looking at my post from last time... that was a really condescending sounding way to say thanks. I hadn't meant that. ;; I'm sorry!)

[Lightmaster]

Okay, SacredWind has mentioned something (which I want to go deeper) an important aspect that needs to be polished: Balance, because a sudden Zero Reimu at Lv.28 in AW isn't balance at all. Heck, even in AW, EX forms are outclassed quickly as early as in the Muendzuka, because Zero puppets (and Last Words since Erika or Tenshi, whenever your order of doing the things in AW) begins to appear since this point (the first one being ZReimu, even ZMarisa was part of Marisa's team, until it was changed). I could quote the main points (which I agree), besides Balancing (and I think one of the points is referenced into the issues here mentioned in the thread, which is the part of the english grammar), but I think these runs of WL / AW that Agastya did should tell you something:

http://lkaexe.supersanctuary.net/nitpickzone/

Please take this into consideration.

[Starxsword]

ZReimu is not too bad if you have the right team. As long as Sunny Milk can survive 1 hit, you can beat ZReimu.

[Lightmaster]

Sorry, but there are FAR better counters for ZReimu, rather than Sunnymilk (she's vulnerable to AncientPower). If you picked Sanae as your starter, with enough levels (like... Lv.30-32), you can just shrug off her non-STAB attacks, and returning Thunderbolt and Psikokinesis with Mirror Coat. Also, a Lunasa can also tank her and defeat her easily, proving she has enough levels, of course.

And besides, that doesn't excuse the lack of balance of both games. Zero Reimu shouldn't be so early in game (in fact, neither Zeros nor unnecessary Last Words should exist. Read Agastya's nitpicks for more details). If something, EReimu should be much more suitable, with a moveset like: Focus Flight / Musou Tensei / Shadow Ball / Brick Break, with Salac Berry.

Welp... that's all for now.

[Starxsword]

If Sanae requires level 30 to 32, then no, I would disagree with the assertion that there are "FAR better counters" than Sunny Milk. You can beat it with a level 30 or so Sunny Milk. I had more trouble beating the random level 40 in the cave than Reimu.

Do remember that even though Sunnymilk suffers weakness to Ancient Power, Ancient Power is only 60 power. Meaning she is taking an attack of 120 power. Too bad you don't have a Quick Claw, otherwise Reimu is a joke with Sunny Milk.
Obviously, if ZReimu triggers the +stats on Ancient Power, you have to start over. That is for sure. However, the reason why that part of the fight is hard is because you do need to grind until around level 30 or so. If you manage to get a ghost, it gets even easier.

And I disagree with Agastya's nitpicks. I don't see the problem with balance as long as there is a scale. The whole point of Zero Touhous (you get one of this at the very end) usable only by the comps is so that it is more difficult.

Now, please explain this lack of balance? When you play Pokemon, do you expect to use non-evolve forms against the boss of Pokemon Platinum? I treat Last Words as another evolution, as this is post game material. So, should it not be expected that you use non outdated Touhous? Also, there are several Ex-Touhous that are better than Last Words.

[ttly not agastya]

Oh lm posted my stupid "lp" I guess I have to get involved now

The problem with last words being player obtainable is that they were never intended to be player obtainable, in official they were just the playable cast of TH08 with 680 BST and placed on the E4 rematch to challenge the player further due to the fact the AI can't get EVs, only max IVs/base stats/a nature (idk how its assigned yet)

Balance was relatively fine among most EX forms in 1.5 (barring EX Youmu killing literally everything but thats unrelated) but once Last Words are thrown into the mix things that already had a relatively hard time being relevant (most PC98s) but could get by are left in the dust because they're not somebody's favorite character so they didn't get another evolution

Either every char the player can use must be able to Last Word or none of them should be player obtainable, you shouldn't be punished for liking Sara and wanting to use her on your team

On to Zeros, the balance issue is that due to how stats work once you reach a certain threshold you just cant really do anything efficiently without using Toxic

If their offenses are too high, you have to use a dedicated wall (like a Yukari form) and kill it with Toxic while using recovery items
If their defenses are too high you have to kill it with Toxic for it to die in a reasonable timeframe (even LwMomiji has trouble 2hkoing some of the things in AW postgame at +1 and she has 180 atk and the ability to get EV trained)

Having the illusion of party building is great and all but after about the 50th Toxic kill its dull and repetitive
It's fine and all if you like that but just because you do doesn't mean everybody else does and that shouldn't be enforced
If these were hacks where the girls were fakemon instead of girls and they were posted on pokecommunity or whatever they'd be laughed off the face of the map for some of these design choices

Anyway back on the actual "rebalance" thing every now and then I've been trying to challenge myself by justifying how AW progresses with the whole "oh look it's another region except now it's just 1.5 official +20 levels and now it's back to another region" thing without rebuilding it from the ground up and basically every iteration I've come across has ended up with "remove every Zero and don't spam Last Words"

if i can come up with a way to make the plot not terribly painful maybe i'll write it down sometime

[trancehime]

If Sanae requires level 30 to 32, then no, I would disagree with the assertion that there are "FAR better counters" than Sunny Milk. You can beat it with a level 30 or so Sunny Milk. I had more trouble beating the random level 40 in the cave than Reimu.

lel do you know what you're talking about? Lv40 konngara is a joke compared to Reimu's ZReimu, who has incredibly stupid base stats for that level and if you can beat it with a level 30 Sunny Milk you must have either evolved Sunny Milk to ESunny-Milk super early (which is possible) or you were blessed with gdlk IVs, because I have experimented with this and I find that Sunny Milk gets 2hko'd by ZReimu's AncientPower at Lv30, hope you enjoy your item spam.

Challenge does not fucking necessitate grinding 5 to 15 levels higher than your opponent just to get past literally one Pokemon/Boneka roadblock

Do remember that even though Sunnymilk suffers weakness to Ancient Power, Ancient Power is only 60 power. Meaning she is taking an attack of 120 power. Too bad you don't have a Quick Claw, otherwise Reimu is a joke with Sunny Milk.
Obviously, if ZReimu triggers the +stats on Ancient Power, you have to start over.

120 base power off of ZReimu's stats yes totally weaksauce against Sunny Milk's mediocre bulk

And I disagree with Agastya's nitpicks. I don't see the problem with balance as long as there is a scale. The whole point of Zero Touhous (you get one of this at the very end) usable only by the comps is so that it is more difficult.

Now, please explain this lack of balance? When you play Pokemon, do you expect to use non-evolve forms against the boss of Pokemon Platinum? I treat Last Words as another evolution, as this is post game material. So, should it not be expected that you use non outdated Touhous? Also, there are several Ex-Touhous that are better than Last Words.

Scale? WHAT SCALE? The scale is wonky as fuck in Another World that it might as well just not exist. Want to beat the Zero Touhous? Grind until you drop or throw away any semblance of team creativity and fun and just throw up a billion walls with Toxic... Yeah that's so fun...

Part of the fun with the Touhoumon games is using the Touhou character that you like; obviously people will be sad if they find that a Touhoumon that they like ends up being obsoleted because they didn't get any better forms aside from what they already had (I love you Shinki but your evolution sucks compared to the plethora of other E-Touhous and LW-Touhous out there).

[Starxsword]

lel do you know what you're talking about? Lv40 konngara is a joke compared to Reimu's ZReimu, who has incredibly stupid base stats for that level and if you can beat it with a level 30 Sunny Milk you must have either evolved Sunny Milk to ESunny-Milk super early (which is possible) or you were blessed with gdlk IVs, because I have experimented with this and I find that Sunny Milk gets 2hko'd by ZReimu's AncientPower at Lv30, hope you enjoy your item spam.

As I have already mentioned. Sunny Milk ONLY needs to survive ONE hit from ZReimu to beat her. As long as you land Will O Wisp, you are in the clear. You can then swap to a better tank and just use defense skills until ZReimu dies. Burn effect HALVES attack power, which is huge, because ZReimu has only 1 special attack, Thunderbolt or something like that. So use a Ground, Grass, etc. Touhou and you are fine.
ZReimu has godly stats yes, however she doesn't have godly offense, it is not crazy high like ZSakuya or ZMarisa with Drizzle combo or ZYoumu with Pure Power, but it is still fairly high. ZReimu is also type , so she receives no STAB bonuses at all.

Balance was relatively fine among most EX forms in 1.5 (barring EX Youmu killing literally everything but thats unrelated) but once Last Words are thrown into the mix things that already had a relatively hard time being relevant (most PC98s) but could get by are left in the dust because they're not somebody's favorite character so they didn't get another evolution

I believe it was Remilia was it, that was better than quite a few Last Words. One of her forms have Speed Up and Mind's Eye combo. Auto sweep their team after setup. Which can be done if you have people that can sleep, paralyze, freeze, etc. You only need to survive the initial barrage and once you get Mind's Eye going, you win.

The problem with last words being player obtainable is that they were never intended to be player obtainable, in official they were just the playable cast of TH08 with 680 BST and placed on the E4 rematch to challenge the player further due to the fact the AI can't get EVs, only max IVs/base stats/a nature (idk how its assigned yet)

I think both you are missing something critical in Pokemon gameplay in general. Damage calculation is by multiplication and division. This means that as numbers go up, it matters LESS.
For example, the difference between 400 attack and 600 attack is EQUAL to the difference between 200 attack and 300 attack. In both cases, you gained 50% more attack power which is 75% of what Mind's Eye does.

In Touhoumon World Link and Another World, instead of the special 680 BST Touhous, you get the special 990 BST Touhous. I don't really see an issue with that.
That said, there is another thing. The only person I need to use Toxic/stall combo is against Aichiya where you face all Zero Touhous in Doubles format. This is because you can never set up to sweep quick enough in doubles format. I never need to use that kind of thing against any other enemy.

[LeviLamprey]

No.
No.
No.
Regardless of whether or not you enjoy the hack, this is bullshit that needs fixing. Burning something with 170 Sp. Atk off even an evolved Sunny when it has two special moves of decently high power is still leaving you open to attack and death everywhere. And what on Earth is with the difference between attack powers have you ever fought a competitive Chandelure with 145 Sp. Atk it manages to kill nearly everything so why would you consider even an endgame boss having 990 BST to be okay. A WILD single encounter with that BST is formidable enough.
You're also ignoring the fact that almost every form becomes obsolete by the end of the game. Things like EMugetsu can simply not hope to do anything by the end of the game and you're forced to slot Last Words into every available slot just to have a hope of survival.
And then the endgame League uses Destroy on everything so it doesn't matter anyway and you still die.

[Starxsword]

You must be missing something. The goal of bosses is that they have better characters than you. Which is why the Boss of Platinum has that broken Garchomp. I believe it has perfect EVs, does it not?
Stat placement also matters. Having 700 BST is irrelevant if they are in the wrong spots or you have bogus typing. For example, you have 255 base attack (max 609 attack with neutral nature), but your best move is Slash (70 power) without STAB. This makes you worse than a character with 120 (max 339 attack with neutral nature) base attack with STAB(Same Type Attack Bonus) Close Combat. This is because total output (70 * 609) < (180 * 339).

For example, if all your characters have around 500 BST, a boss carrying a 700 BST character would be a challenge. Now, the difference is you have around 700 BST characters, so a boss carrying 1000 BST would be a challenge.

And what on Earth is with the difference between attack powers have you ever fought a competitive Chandelure with 145 Sp. Atk it manages to kill nearly everything so why would you consider even an endgame boss having 990 BST to be okay. A WILD single encounter with that BST is formidable enough.

Do you use COUNTER characters for that pokemon? The reason why Chandelure is awesome is because of it's stat distribution, moveset, and typing. Good stats matter a lot less if you have garbage move sets.
Chandelure is a good example stat distribution. Note, this pokemon ONLY has 520 BST. Why is it better than say Dragonite(who I believe is not even competitive), who has 600 BST? Clearly, it is because of it's stat distribution.

Again, I reiterate, as stats scale UP, it gets less EFFECTIVE. For example a jump between 70 (239 max) base special attack to 145 (389) base special attack is almost double. However a jump from 145 (389 max) to 215 (529 max) is not even close to double. It is not even a 50% jump in EFFECTIVENESS. One is about a 62% jump in power and the latter is a 35% jump in power.

@Destroy: There is 1 Pokemon that can use Destroy and that is Flandre. Not ZFlandre, only LFlandre. It has 1 Use, so kill it or it kills you, since it does have 100% accuracy.

[SuccinctAndPunchy]

I have tried playing World Link and Another World in the past.

Oh god please fix the balancing.  Both games are full of so much crap that just pops out of the woodworks and has BST up the wazoo, it's absurd.

I think the first indicator I had that these games were going to to be brutally unfair was right at the start of World Link where someone pops the fuck out of nowhere and chucks a Vocaloid with ridiculously high BST in your face and it only gets worse from there in those two games. I watched some videos online of late game Another World and it's pretty much just nothing but Lvl100 ZForms.

I'd honestly consider the balancing to be a way more pressing problem when it comes to fixing these games then any untranslated romaji or bugs could ever be, since the pair of games are so brutally unfun to play as a result of only Pokemon with absurdly high BST stats being viable later on and only ZForms being viable in the very lategame, it's kinda not allowing you any wiggle room with team building that kills this game IMO.

[LeviLamprey]

I can see you're adopting a completely na?ve point of view here, but mine is completely biased as well, obviously.
One thing, though: Dragonite is a top-tier OU threat. Stats do matter.
It doesn't matter, all your stat theory, not when a game is tossing you things like that ZReimu when you have 300-500 BST mons desperately flailing around, and then later you have some random 'boss' with nothing but Ex fairies.
It's not a puzzle game, it's an RPG. It's not Final Fantasy. It's a Pok?mon hack and it's meant to be a fun challenge, not one where you grind for seven hours on Level -87 Chibi Star Sapphire to get to Level 30 so you can use Mirror Coat.
World Link grinding, too, is atrocious, and the fact the game is so easy until it magically spikes when Aichiya decides to stop blatantly ripping of Scarlet Emerald (say hello to Poison Bomb ExShou and BNightbird ExIchirin) and throws Java at you is just pathetic.
He's a good guy with sound hacking knowledge and he has no excuse for ruining what had the potential to be a pair of exciting and absorbing hacks to the point where you hack in 255 Exp. EV-tailored Chibi Minoriko to cut grinding time from ten hours to three.
Games. Are. Meant. To. Be. Fun.
Again, I'm being biased but dear god at least learn what statistical balance means before you start telling me these things are easy to defeat.
I'm not even mentioning the bugs that these ROM hacks are riddled with or the ridiculously misdistributed movesets.

EDIT: Also, the Gensokyo League is filled with Destroy. Gap Yukari that throws Destroy at you, the Moon sisters, and Flandre is more than enough.

[Starxsword]

It doesn't matter, all your stat theory, not when a game is tossing you things like that ZReimu when you have 300-500 BST mons desperately flailing around, and then later you have some random 'boss' with nothing but Ex fairies.

Outside of that Reimu using characters with levels slightly on the high side, I have no issues with that battle. It is a tough battle, yes, since you do need to be about 30 or so, which means grinding. If Reimu was using characters slightly lower levels, than there would be no grinding, however you will then have to grind once you get to the first gym, because those guys are too high level.
As I have already said, you have several answers for Reimu. One being Ghost with Omega Guard, another being Sunny Milk and Will O Wisp. This does mean she would need to survive at least 1 hit from ZReimu. Sunny Milk should be faster than Sakuya and also 1 shots Sakuya, so you are good there too.

One thing, though: Dragonite is a top-tier OU threat. Stats do matter.

What? Dragonite is OU tier? Are there no fast Ice pokemons in the meta or something? Dragonite has a semi worthless ability and has only decent stat distribution. I understand Garchomp and Salamence being OU, but Dragonite?
Or do you mean Dragonite with MULTISCALE ability, since Black and White came out? Because there is no way Dragonite can be OU tier. 600 BST doesn't mean much with mediocre stat distribution.

It's a Pok?mon hack and it's meant to be a fun challenge, not one where you grind for seven hours on Level -87 Chibi Star Sapphire to get to Level 30 so you can use Mirror Coat.

Yes, it is meant to be a fun challenge. Unfortunately, as you know, like all Touhou hacks and I am not talking about just Aichiya's hack. The Touhoumon games have a higher difficulty than the base game.

That said, the grinding in World Link post game is not any worse than the normal game. I don't quite see how you are saying it is worse. I have played the main and post game of World Link and the grinding is about equal. Which I am not arguing that is fun, since I dislike grinding in general.
The post game enemies are way harder, but you get way more XP.

Again, I'm being biased but dear god at least learn what statistical balance means before you start telling me these things are easy to defeat.

Difficulty level is definitely above base Emerald Pokemon. Heck the champion has a very strong team. I was wiped the first time I fought the champion. But then again that also happened to me when I faced the champion in Diamond, Garchomp was simply too much for my team.

EDIT: Also, the Gensokyo League is filled with Destroy. Gap Yukari that throws Destroy at you, the Moon sisters, and Flandre is more than enough.

Gensokyo League and the special boss are hard, yeah. It is a doubles match so you need to stock up on your potions and stuff. Since you fight 10 consecutive battles or so.

[LeviLamprey]

I meant World Link grinding pre-E4. It takes significantly longer than in vanilla because everything gives about one experience without fail.
Higher difficulty does not mean extra grinding. That's not difficulty, that's tedium.
And Dragonite has always been a competitive threat, even before Multiscale, because its stat distribution is GOOD. 134 Attack, solid defenses and Sp. Atk and an easily boosted Speed, as well as a huge movepool.
Sunnymilk doesn't hard counter ZReimu, as people have said already.
At this point you aren't even arguing anymore, just showing you really don't see eye to eye with anyone else in this thread, and I believe I've derailed it enough, so if I post again, it'll be to give constructive criticism or advice to the OP.
And don't even tell me Destroy is hard. It's just dumb.

[trancehime]

You must be missing something. The goal of bosses is that they have better characters than you. Which is why the Boss of Platinum has that broken Garchomp. I believe it has perfect EVs, does it not?

Actually Cynthia's Garchomp has perfect IVs. Get it right

Stat placement also matters. Having 700 BST is irrelevant if they are in the wrong spots or you have bogus typing. For example, you have 255 base attack (max 609 attack with neutral nature), but your best move is Slash (70 power) without STAB. This makes you worse than a character with 120 (max 339 attack with neutral nature) base attack with STAB(Same Type Attack Bonus) Close Combat. This is because total output (70 * 609) < (180 * 339).

lol

For example, if all your characters have around 500 BST, a boss carrying a 700 BST character would be a challenge. Now, the difference is you have around 700 BST characters, so a boss carrying 1000 BST would be a challenge.

Because having higher base stat totals always constitutes a challenge, right? Whatever happened to being FUCKING CREATIVE WITH YOUR MOVESETS AND TEAM SETUPS? See: Battle Frontier, Pokemon BW2 Pokemon World Tournament Having a boss that carries statistically superior Pokemon, with the high possibility that they will have illegal movesets, mandates that you, as the player, need to grind to a specific point to be able to -

#1: Survive the onslaught
#2: Hit back and sweep properly
#3: Make sure you can account for critical hits and misses

In Pokemon, genuine challenge is almost NEVER derived from statistic superiority, it is almost ALWAYS derived from clever moveset and team composition. I suggest you actually try playing more Pokemon games or well-designed romhacks than cite Pokemon Another World/World Link as "legitimate difficulty," because this is FAR from legitimate difficulty, this is ARTIFICIAL difficulty. Bitch please.

Do you use COUNTER characters for that pokemon? The reason why Chandelure is awesome is because of it's stat distribution, moveset, and typing. Good stats matter a lot less if you have garbage move sets.
Chandelure is a good example stat distribution. Note, this pokemon ONLY has 520 BST. Why is it better than say Dragonite(who I believe is not even competitive), who has 600 BST? Clearly, it is because of it's stat distribution.

Except Chandelure isn't better than Dragonite. I'm sorry, but bitch please, Chandelure only got acclaim because of SHADOW TAG. Without Shadow Tag, the best Chandy can do is hit things that are slower than it and watch them explode. Which ISN'T VERY MANY in the OU metagame. Good grief, do you even know your metagame theory? Dragonite has solid physical bulk, can actually set up (unlike Chandelure!) and has a good variety of move options, something Chandelure can not even match in a hyper-offensive metagame.

Again, I reiterate, as stats scale UP, it gets less EFFECTIVE. For example a jump between 70 (239 max) base special attack to 145 (389) base special attack is almost double. However a jump from 145 (389 max) to 215 (529 max) is not even close to double. It is not even a 50% jump in EFFECTIVENESS. One is about a 62% jump in power and the latter is a 35% jump in power.

yawn theorycrafting can only go so far. why don't you go do some field work and validate those statistics - you're still subject to variance and many other variables in the attack damage formula...

@Destroy: There is 1 Pokemon that can use Destroy and that is Flandre. Not ZFlandre, only LFlandre. It has 1 Use, so kill it or it kills you, since it does have 100% accuracy.

@Destroy: why does this move even fucking exist in the first place? can you justify that outside of bullshit thematic?

What? Dragonite is OU tier? Are there no fast Ice pokemons in the meta or something? Dragonite has a semi worthless ability and has only decent stat distribution. I understand Garchomp and Salamence being OU, but Dragonite?
Or do you mean Dragonite with MULTISCALE ability, since Black and White came out? Because there is no way Dragonite can be OU tier. 600 BST doesn't mean much with mediocre stat distribution.

Look at this kid, clinging to 3rd gen. Also Garchomp is Uber-only and Salamence is Uber/OU as of 5th gen. :V
In 4th gen, Salamence was Uber-only along with Garchomp, making Dragonite the only Dragon-type threat in OU

>Mediocre stat distribution
134/100/80 offenses?
91/95/100 defenses?
Mediocre? BITCH PLEASE, it's a lot better stat distribution than OU Pokemon #198367363853573

Dragonite has a billion possible movesets he can choose from in order to ruin the enemy team... Multiscale in Gen5 was only an even bigger boon in the dragon's favor. Being able to properly set up with little fear from the opposition, even going so far as to use SubDD, make it really freaking good. It can even parashuffle if it wants to. Oh and did you know this mofugger gets ROOST? Because he gets Roost. Actually I could go on and on but this is stupid because it's clear you're not even going to acknowledge this and remain in the past.

As I have already said, you have several answers for Reimu. One being Ghost with Omega Guard, another being Sunny Milk and Will O Wisp. This does mean she would need to survive at least 1 hit from ZReimu. Sunny Milk should be faster than Sakuya and also 1 shots Sakuya, so you are good there too.

This still doesn't justify ZReimu being a thing that early.
EDIT:

here's what happens when you field omega guard ghost against ZReimu:

Frameskip Lick Spam until ZReimu runs out of PP
Have the ghost tank ZReimu struggles off of 150 base ATK
Hope to god you survive

Yes, it is meant to be a fun challenge. Unfortunately, as you know, like all Touhou hacks and I am not talking about just Aichiya's hack. The Touhoumon games have a higher difficulty than the base game.

At least some of the Touhoumon hacks don't have bullshit artificial difficulty like Aichiya's hack does. The fellow's a great hacker, but he just has incredibly poor design sense.

That said, the grinding in World Link post game is not any worse than the normal game. I don't quite see how you are saying it is worse. I have played the main and post game of World Link and the grinding is about equal.

Pre-Elite Four you are dealing with Touhoumon that probably have incredibly poor EXP rates to begin with, which makes grinding even harder. No, I don't want more XP in the post-game because I'M ALREADY DONE WITH THE GAME. Geez. No scale at all.

[Starxsword]

In Pokemon, genuine challenge is almost NEVER derived from statistic superiority, it is almost ALWAYS derived from clever moveset and team composition. I suggest you actually try playing more Pokemon games or well-designed romhacks than cite Pokemon Another World/World Link as "legitimate difficulty," because this is FAR from legitimate difficulty, this is ARTIFICIAL difficulty. Bitch please.

I've played starting from Red to Platinum. So, yes I have played quite a few Pokemon games. I was supposed to wait for Gray, before playing Gen 5, but it seems like they won't be making a Gray version. So please don't give me this BS about not knowing about pokemon.

Pokemon was NEVER a challenge. The only semi challenging pokemon game was Diamond/Platinum. Battle Tower was I guess a challenging place, but it was mainly rage inducing because of the RNG. I cannot cite legitimately "difficult games" when none of them are.

Actually Cynthia's Garchomp has perfect IVs. Get it right

Yes, I incorrectly said the wrong thing. I am sure other posters understood exactly what I was talking about.

yawn theorycrafting can only go so far. why don't you go do some field work and validate those statistics - you're still subject to variance and many other variables in the attack damage formula...

There is no theorycrafting about this. Try it out yourself. That is the attack damage formula. It has always been [attack stat] multiplied by [attack power of move] divide by [defense stat]. It is a very simple formula. There are not "many variables", those numbers are more or less static  in the attack formula. The only real variable is the variance and critical hit. I don't quite remember the variance, maybe 1.00 to 1.20 or something. I also don't quite know how the critical hit formula works, but it ignores defense somehow.

Frameskip Lick Spam until ZReimu runs out of PP
Have the ghost tank ZReimu struggles off of 150 base ATK
Hope to god you survive

150 base ATK is not much when she uses Struggle.

And Dragonite has always been a competitive threat, even before Multiscale, because its stat distribution is GOOD. 134 Attack, solid defenses and Sp. Atk and an easily boosted Speed, as well as a huge movepool.

Which is my question, Are there no 81+ speed ice pokemons in the meta? That would be a major reason why Dragonite can be competitive. Having 4x weakness to ice is a major drawback and he does not have the speed to cover that drawback. He gets one shotted by most ice pokemon and even none ice pokemon with 81+ base speed. I can only assume Weavile is not used competively then.

Sunnymilk doesn't hard counter ZReimu, as people have said already.

I already mentioned the levels you need to beat ZReimu. If you think 30 is too much, then you are right.  Sunny Milk does not counter ZReimu.

At this point you aren't even arguing anymore, just showing you really don't see eye to eye with anyone else in this thread, and I believe I've derailed it enough, so if I post again, it'll be to give constructive criticism or advice to the OP.

That is because you complained about balance, when I don't see how it is any different from the other hacks or really pokemon in general.

[LeviLamprey]

I have no words anymore.
It's okay to enjoy playing it, but it's not okay to think the balance matches that of vanilla Pok?mon.
Just. No.

[trancehime]

I've played starting from Red to Platinum. So, yes I have played quite a few Pokemon games. I was supposed to wait for Gray, before playing Gen 5, but it seems like they won't be making a Gray version. So please don't give me this BS about not knowing about pokemon.

* trancehime points at Pokemon Black and White 2

 

:fail:

:colonveeplusalpha:

Pokemon was NEVER a challenge. The only semi challenging pokemon game was Diamond/Platinum. Battle Tower was I guess a challenging place, but it was mainly rage inducing because of the RNG. I cannot cite legitimately "difficult games" when none of them are.

lol

There is no theorycrafting about this. Try it out yourself. That is the attack damage formula. It has always been [attack stat] multiplied by [attack power of move] divide by [defense stat]. It is a very simple formula. There are not "many variables", those numbers are more or less static  in the attack formula. The only real variable is the variance and critical hit. I don't quite remember the variance, maybe 1.00 to 1.20 or something. I also don't quite know how the critical hit formula works, but it ignores defense somehow.

weather
entry hazards (which aren't accessible that early)
STAB
variance
chance to critical
stat boosts/setting up

150 base ATK is not much when she uses Struggle.

remind me of the ghost's base HP again

also ZReimu's typing gives her STAB off of Struggle

Which is my question, Are there no 81+ speed ice pokemons in the meta? That would be a major reason why Dragonite can be competitive. Having 4x weakness to ice is a major drawback and he does not have the speed to cover that drawback. He gets one shotted by most ice pokemon and even none ice pokemon with 81+ base speed. I can only assume Weavile is not used competively then.

um

Dragon Dance

Roost

ExtremeSpeed

i don't think i need to explain myself any further, good day to you sir :colbert:
by the way almost all the viable dragonite checks aren't even ice types lol

I already mentioned the levels you need to beat ZReimu. If you think 30 is too much, then you are right.  Sunny Milk does not counter ZReimu.

grinding does not justify the existence of a Touhoumon as bullshit as ZReimu that early. I am pretty sure Brock's levels after ZReimu are as high as they are BECAUSE Aichiya probably wanted you to grind to hell and back for this fight. :colbert:

That is because you complained about balance, when I don't see how it is any different from the other hacks or really pokemon in general.

:fail:

[rullare]

hi i'm trying to hack or mad this games but i don't know where to start anyone that can help me get to the right way?

[Starxsword]

* trancehime points at Pokemon Black and White 2

Please read my post, I figured it was implied when I used "supposed". I said I was supposed to wait for Gray, which obviously would not happen since Black/White 2 is coming out.

weather
entry hazards (which aren't accessible that early)
STAB
variance
chance to critical
stat boosts/setting up

Not part of the damage formula.
STAB should be obvious, this is already included in attack. An attack with 80 power is 80 power is the calculation. A STABBED attack at 80 power is 120 as far as effective attack is concerned.
Variance, variance is not a variable. Variance is just the RNG. The variance is 0.85 to 1.00, I went ahead and checked.
stat/boosts, setting, which are part of the damage formula.
May as well add weakness/resistance if you count STAB.

However, as I have mentioned, the only real variable you need to see is Attack stat and Attack power of the skill. Yes, I am aware that levels also affect damage, but as far as I am concerned, those would be static.

Here is the damage formula from serebii.net, http://serebii.net/games/damage.shtml:
Damage = ((((2 * Level / 5 + 2) * AttackStat * AttackPower / DefenseStat) / 50) + 2) * STAB * Weakness/Resistance * RandomNumber / 100

As you can see, yes there are several variables, more than what I mentioned, however the main ones that would concern you for damage calculation would be AttackStat * AttackPower / DefenseStat.
The rest of it is easy or mainly static(if we assumed 2 pokemons are of same levels), so you do not need to worry too much about it. If pokemon are of different levels, then yes, that would also be an issue.

*Chance to critical, I don't know the damage formula for critical hits, so I ignored it. It works differently. I know it ignores defense somehow, but I don't know how it works. I guess you can read up on it if you want to know how critical hits work.

Also, as I have mentioned multiple times, I do not see how Dragonite, prior to Multiscale is competitive(especially since you guys mentioned it is in OU tier), when you have 2 clearly superior choices. One is Garchomp and the other is Salamence. Garchomp brings power and speed, while Salamence has Intimidate, a very good skill.
I am utterly confused at how Dragonite can be in the OU tier, it just doesn't make any sense to me. Especially since Dragonite is not that fast and dies to ice attacks. X4 weakness is brutal.

It's okay to enjoy playing it, but it's not okay to think the balance matches that of vanilla Pok?mon.

From your post, you imply that Mew Two is balanced?


EDIT: In any case, for my suggestions. One of the issues I have with World Link and Another World is grinding. The levels opposing trainers don't scale all that well, so you need to grind too much for my liking. I would suggest first tweaking the levels of the opposing pokemon teams. This way, you can effectively scale all the way to 100 once you are near end of post game.
This part requires quite a bit of tweaking, since you need to do several tests to get the levels right. Especially if you want to scale to level 100, which I suggest is a good idea. I am unsure if you need to give more XP or if possible give bonus XP for some trainer fights.

[trancehime]

Not part of the damage formula.
STAB should be obvious, this is already included in attack. An attack with 80 power is 80 power is the calculation. A STABBED attack at 80 power is 120 as far as effective attack is concerned.
Variance, variance is not a variable. Variance is just the RNG. The variance is 0.85 to 1.00, I went ahead and checked.
stat/boosts, setting, which are part of the damage formula.
May as well add weakness/resistance if you count STAB.

Stop hiding behind the fucking damage formula and talk about how it works in actual practice, please.

*Chance to critical, I don't know the damage formula for critical hits, so I ignored it. It works differently. I know it ignores defense somehow, but I don't know how it works. I guess you can read up on it if you want to know how critical hits work.

Critical hits ignore defenses and the modifiers of the opponent that would reduce the damage otherwise.

How confusing is that, really? This isn't even RBY where critical hits were broken and ignored ALL modifiers, even positive ones on the attacker.

Also, as I have mentioned multiple times, I do not see how Dragonite, prior to Multiscale is competitive(especially since you guys mentioned it is in OU tier), when you have 2 clearly superior choices. One is Garchomp and the other is Salamence. Garchomp brings power and speed, while Salamence has Intimidate, a very good skill.
I am utterly confused at how Dragonite can be in the OU tier, it just doesn't make any sense to me. Especially since Dragonite is not that fast and dies to ice attacks. X4 weakness is brutal.

i just fucking mentioned 3 fucking moves that made Dragonite viable prior to Multiscale and you went and shat all over it with your failure to consider tier meta. Ubers and OU are completely different from each other, don't even mix them together. Oh and did you know Dragonite's the only Dragon-type with a priority move who isn't Rayquaza (that move is ExtremeSpeed, WHICH I FUCKING MENTIONED EARLIER)?

From your post, you imply that Mew Two is balanced?

Mewtwo is a legendary who was intentionally made to be ridiculous, and Mewtwo's base Special Attack is 154. Mewtwo's BST is 680.
That's 310 less than the Zero Boneka, and if we are considering ZReimu, ZReimu has 16 more base Special Attack than Mewtwo, has the SAME base Special Attack as White Kyurem, while ALSO having almost twice the amount of effective durability.

Please don't even talk about vanilla Legendaries in Pokemon and then claim that Zero Boneka are suddenly balanced.