NPCs and Gym Leaders

[UnbreakableProdigy]

The only issue I've seen so far, is this. While I think 24 hours is a good time span, it can be somewhat of an annoying issue when the server freezes while your in a gym leader battle, and you didn't technically lose, but the wait time happens anyway. I was battling Lt. Surge and has him down to his last Pokemon and then it said "Please Wait" so I waited and waited and waited, and then the client crashed. So it got labeled as a DC. I think somehow the game should be able to tell between DC's due to server error and people just DCing. It'd be helpful to low levels like me who want to get through the game at a decent pace, and not have to stop and wait 24 hours because of a server error, not our own fault. While I know that this game IS in Beta form and crashes happen, it can be a bit of an annoyance. Also, sometimes when crashes happen your Pokemon get leveled back a few levels, but the rest of your progress is saved? That happened to be earlier during the crash at the Gym. That's the only complaints I have. Other than that? Nothing. Games amazing guys. Keep up the good work.

 

[Deejay]

I think something should be done about this crashing / disconnection error after waiting 24 hours patiently farming util 8:30pm GMT tonight i finally got to be able to rematch the 2nd gym leader and won although the stupid rollback happened and i lost my lvl's and my gym badge.

Now it say's i cannot battle the gym leader and now have to wait another 24 hour's which is rather P***ed me right off and just made me lose the will to play anymore i suggest finding some way to prevent this happening in future as i seen alot of people in-game getting annoyed by losing a (S) or HR.

All i have to say on this matter.

Deejay

 

[SQINI]

Hi

I also agree that the waiting period should be shorter when it comes to NPC'S...i think that in 2 week you grow and evolve way more than the NPC's...

SQINI

 

[Fionavara]

Personally I think everythings fine as it is, I use the resets as a way to lvl my pokes to 99 and battling all the NPCs in the game takes about 15 hours for both regions, 10 for kanto and 5 for johto...should the NPC time be reduced then it would be a heck of a job to have to rebattle them every time u want to move around between the maps and that would be just annoying to us that finished the gyms and focus on hunting and trading.
Having the NPCs reset often is far from nessecary for the game enjoyment. NPCs are just bonus exp and only there for getting rep to battle next gym and since rep is completly useless after u beaten the gyms what's the point in rebattling the NPCs over and over again more often then every 2 week. To get more 99 faster? meh that's just lazyness if caliming that, as u can get train normaly in both DD and CC for that.
Ofc you could go a middle way, the NPCs in the GYMs only get reseted every week and the rest around the regions stays at 2 weeks....since its the gym NPC that gives the serious amount of exp for training and the otherones really just in the way after u finished the gyms.

But my problem is that the NPC balance between the Johto ones and the Kanto ones are seriously lacking since the npcs in johto clearly is lacking both in number of pokes per NPC and their lvls and the amount of NPCs compared to Kanto... which makes it much much harder to start in johto and lvl up compared to starting in kanto..not the time between the resets.

 

[CoolKnightST]

I think I have an idea for the NPC's status:

When NPC is ready to battle

When NPC has an quest

When quest is in progress

When quest is complete

Q&A NPC's

• When talking to an battle NPC he tells you how long you will need to wait before you can battle again.
• You can't acces the gym leader when he's in cooldown. Afther your win you will be teleport back outside the gym. When you talk to the NPC in front of the gym he will tell you how long you will have to wait untile you can enter again.
• And extra in the above rule can be that the NPC is for you visible right from the door instant of in front of the door.

---
To make NPC's more intressting an modification to the cooldown might be intressting:

• Gym Leaders: 24 hours (like normal)
• NPC's class A: 20 hours (this are NPC's that reach to you equal, there pokémons are stronger than the pokémons that you can catch in that area. For example bugcatchers in Viridian Forest pokémon can be encounter up to level 8 (think it's higher). Than his pokémon will be arround that level.
• NPC's class B: 15 hours (this are NPC's with middle level pokémon. There levels are with the example above arround the level 5.
• NPC's class C: 10 hours (this are NPC's with mostly weak pokémon. Mostly directly catched and put to battle.
• NPC's class X: 1 hour (this are NPC's mostly in citys that love you battle, they mostly are attempt to do this every hour. Downside to this NPC's is that they will get stronger afther every battle. You will also have to talk to them and have reputation in order to battle them. This reputation will increase every battle.

Edite: I also made this one for battle NPC's that are in cooldown. I personaly don't think he's needed and will make it harder to see an differents between an battle NPC's an an battle cooldown NPC, but I post it anyway:

 

[Merse]

One more thing: I would like to rebattle the gymleaders. In every 3 months or so, but definitely far rarer than an average NPC.
All level 99 Pokes and they would have the Pokes in your original region that they would have if you come from the other.

 

[RoyLost]

I think it would be nice for if you lose to a gym leader its a hour wait not 24 hours because thats just to long of a wait due to how long you have to wait and you cant train that fast after you get to a high level

 

[Gosuto_Imahso]

I actually love the current system, minus ONE thing, The Gym Leader Cool downs are too high. 24hrs (and they glitch every so often) is way too long. I'd be happy with half that. I completely understand the cool down for regular NPC (without it people would be beasts way to quick.) but the Gym leader is for progression purposes only. I am just saying that I thinks its crap to have to wait a whole day when you lose by just a small amount. A cool down is acceptable but not that large of one and not for a stepping stone.

And @ coolknight your suggestion is good but putting glows around npc over-world sprites would kill the look and feel of the game for me personally. I do like where your head is though, some sort of indicator would be kinda nice. As it is now I have NO CLUE when and who i can go back and fight.

 

[Affan6338]

Ok here is my idea.
Why not keep in a record of the NPC (including gym leaders) battle history? It can easily check if the user lost on purpose or not. Then you can clear the 24 hour waiting thing. Would be much easier.
P.S OFF TOPIC. Oh and if you guys are looking for people to restart. I'm mostly online except night. So if server is down I can start up. Well I'm sure there are others. Just telling.

 

[Maideza]

P.S OFF TOPIC. Oh and if you guys are looking for people to restart. I'm mostly online except night. So if server is down I can start up. Well I'm sure there are others. Just telling.

lmao

yeah random people should get server access

 

[Rachlan]

Well, off topic, then, why it seems like no one has a admin phone number? Like moderators, and so? I don't mean to sound harsh, but it is a little nonsense that we have to wait one admin to come willingly take a look at the server just to see if everything is ok, and "oh! look at that! the server is off..!"

Sorry if it's a wrong placed post...

 

[Maideza]

Yeah, how dare the administrators sleep and have a life outside PWO?

HOW DARE YOU LEE, JINJI, XAN AND THE REST OF YOU!?!

 

[Rachlan]

I completely understand your point and have considered it before posting. The thing is: is it that hard to restart the server? I mean, even if it is, doesn't hurt to let them know that the server needs assistance. So, whenever they are able to fix it, they will. I'm not asking them to give up on their lives, I'm just reminding that they have the responsability to keep the servers running. That is something basic, isn't it?
If no one tells them the server is off, they could just do something else with their free time, when they would happilly be here helping our gameplay.

 

[meskalin]

i would , as some people said , raise npcs level in the opposite region and shorter theyr rematch time to one week . Gym leader rematch time is fine . But there must be a way
to gain exp faster after your 8 badge. I would also introduce experience gain and prb money win/lost in pvp matches to spice them up. To prevent experience exploit in intentionnaly loosing to newbies , so they can make easy exp i would introduce 24h cooldown rule to pvp battles as well ( 24h to a certain trainer you have battled ) . Whats the point of rebattling player instantly if he has a better team anyway?

 

[Bluerise]

Ok here is my idea.
Why not keep in a record of the NPC (including gym leaders) battle history? It can easily check if the user lost on purpose or not. Then you can clear the 24 hour waiting thing. Would be much easier.
P.S OFF TOPIC. Oh and if you guys are looking for people to restart. I'm mostly online except night. So if server is down I can start up. Well I'm sure there are others. Just telling.

The issue currently is that every NPC when you first enter a battle is already marked as a loss (nice...). Hence why if the game crashes, it has it logged as you being in a battle. If someone comes up with the idea of 'well, just change that then' - it's not that simple. You'll get people abusing the NPCs by disconnecting every battle.

Also we can't give access to the server, just because you're 'online'. Giving server access means giving access to all the server code and database. It's not happening.

Well, off topic, then, why it seems like no one has a admin phone number?

Because you don't need it.

it is a little nonsense that we have to wait one admin to come willingly take a look at the server

Wrong! I'm presuming the 1 admin you're referring to is me. I usually check within 10 minutes or so of switching on my PC.

The thing is: is it that hard to restart the server?

No, but I think you're missing something.

I mean, even if it is, doesn't hurt to let them know that the server needs assistance.

I get emails if the server is down for over an hour. I'm usually in IRC, on Twitter, on the Forums and MSN so... Though the emails are more useful if say I was out and about but then I wouldn't be able to restart anyway.

Having something like Touch Remote or RDM+ would be useful if it worked and costs were covered for.

If you wish to continue discussing this, I advise making a new topic as it's off-topic.

 

[cyy5113]

Agreed with CoolKnightST's idea, its a good and nice indicator for you to know whether NPC is ready or not.
I also agreed with psychosamm's idea about let we decide to battle or not, it really do gives us advantage, and could save our time when we travel from one location to another.

 

[CoolKnightST]

I actually love the current system, minus ONE thing, The Gym Leader Cool downs are too high. 24hrs (and they glitch every so often) is way too long. I'd be happy with half that. I completely understand the cool down for regular NPC (without it people would be beasts way to quick.) but the Gym leader is for progression purposes only. I am just saying that I thinks its crap to have to wait a whole day when you lose by just a small amount. A cool down is acceptable but not that large of one and not for a stepping stone.

And @ coolknight your suggestion is good but putting glows around npc over-world sprites would kill the look and feel of the game for me personally. I do like where your head is though, some sort of indicator would be kinda nice. As it is now I have NO CLUE when and who i can go back and fight.

I don't think it would be an problem for quests and battles so long the basic (no quest/finished quest and recharge from battle) indicates as no glow. It in fact doens't require an glow from help npc's since there already exist an indicator for it.

For the cooldown time, if it's gameplay time 24 hour. The amount is just to high. I think it's about an week I was able to finish any trainer now. That's kinda frustrating. And is it possible to rebattle gyms? Since I still haven't be able to battle them again.


--------------------------
Here an overview off all current idea in this topic:

Battle NPC's
Battle Markers:
1/ Sword text balloon:
The player with continue say this when he want to battle. Ones he have an visual off you his textballoon change to "!" and continue following the old system.

1b/ Animation improvement 1:
During the action of above (1). The player will do an search animation (twisting his head left and right slowly, to indicate he's searching an fight) [sorry: no example]
1c/ Animation improvement 2:
Ones the player reach the trainer an the battle is accepted both players grab an pokéball:

. This animation also counts for PvP and wild pokémon encountering.
1d/ Animation improvement 3:
Ones you have won the battle different animation can happen depend what npc:
- Happy revive: He tell's you it was an good fight and he has some revives in his pocket and tell you he continue his training and hope on an rematch soon.
- Pokémon center: He tell's you it was an good fight. He teleport/fly/dig/walk or runs to the pokémon center.
- Angry: He hits you back and teleport/fly/dig/walk or runs to the pokémon center.
They will all return to there original position afther some time. They maybe can add some variantion into it like replacing there spam position etc...

Battle encountering:
1/ NPC as obstacles:
NPC should be seen as obstacles that slowdown your passage to new areas. That's why they should become smarter on some points like looking left, right, up and down or even moving an bit to make sure it's almost impossible to prevent an first fight with them in order to travel to your next city. They also should not give passage if your reputation is to low. For simple reasons: The area that they want to reach is currently to strong for them.
1b/ Ignore battles: To improve the above rule you won't have this problem ones you battle them the second time. You can ignore the battle, afther you do this the NPC won't come to you anymore to battle. In order to battle him again you will have to talk to him.
2/ Recharge time: The NPC recharge time should really get reduced to let's say 3 hours gameplay time. I think 3 hours is more than rewarded to battle an npc again.
2b /Get stronger modification: With the change of the above rule the NPC's have an recalculation of get stronger:
- Afther every rebattle npc's pokémons get stronger by 2 levels. Ones they reach the lv of the gym leader weakest pokémon they will not get increased unless you won against the gym leader.
- NPC's pokémons should evolve ones they reach an certain level.

About Gymleader:
1/ Gym passage: I think it's an bit crazy that you can enter the gym in cooldown. This way the npc inside it can be battle on an different time. That's why I suggest to make it so that you only can enter ones you are allowed to.
2/ Recharge time: The recharge time of the gymleader an an bit to high. That's why I suggest to make an cooldown of 6 hours gameplay. Both on win as on lose.
3/ When lose: When you lose against the gymleader you will lose reputation
4/ Pokémon levels:
- Ones you won against the gymleader, all npc's will get reset on 3 levels lower than the weakest pokémon of the gymleader. Exept you already battle them to max they simply get 2 levels stronger ones you battle them. Example: "You didn't battle the first gymleader in kanto yet and you battle against an bugcatcher with an lv 7 metapod over over again. Add an certain point the metapod reach the max level: "13". Now you battle the gymleader and you won. Now the next time you battle the bugcatcher you will battle an metapod of level 15." Example2: "You didn't battle the first gymleader in kanto yet and you battle against an bugcatcher with an lv 7 metapod and you won. You normaly will battle an medapod level 9 in your next fight. But you battle the gymleader and you won. Now the next time you battle the bugcatcher you will battle an metapod (butterfree) of level 10. (3 levels lower than the weakest pokémon of the gym leader)"
- Gymleader will also get stronger if you defeat the next gymleader. For example the levels of the first gymleader will never reach higher than the second one. But if you won against the second one the first gymleader will get stronger up to the level limit you would battle the 2th gymleader an second time.

Gym 1 - 1 win - 2 wins
lv 16 - lv 18 - lv 20 (afther the second win the level of the gymleader max pokémon will not go higher untile you win against the 2th gymleader)

Gym 2 - 1 win - 2 wins
lv 21 - lv 23 - lv 25 (afther the second win the level of the gymleader max pokémon will not go higher untile you win against the 3th gymleader)

Now let's say you won against the 2th gymleader. The limited of the max level increase to lv 24. So the next time you battle against the first gymleader the levels will be lv 22. And the battle afther lv 24.

It looks like an complex system but in fact it are simply some formule rules what I think would make the gameplay more intressting. Now you will be forced to continue in order to battle stronger npc's an gymleaders. In the current system you can battle level 25 on the first gymleader. How crazy is that.

 

[ClemRemy]

Coming from the perspective of a new player... 24 hours for a gym lockout is really, really annoying x__x I lost to Morty in Ecruteak City by a small amount (if he had chosen a couple different moves, I would've won) and for a few hours after that, I spent time working on my team. I had only 3 pokemon that were close-ish to his level, and even with that I nearly won - but now I have all 6 pokemon at or above his level, and in training/killing time I've found 4 growlithes (where they were VR), a jigglypuff (VR) and trained three pokemon up from level 12-16 to mid 20's. It wasn't quick, either, as the highest leveled/closest to Ecruteak patches of grass still only had level 11-15 pokemon that netted me anywhere from 170-450 xp most of the time with the occasional stantler/ledian/ariados giving a bit more. I tried to find higher leveled pokemon in the wild by fishing in dark cave west for the occasional level 17 goldeen, but that only worked with the pokemon who were neutral/had an advantage to water pokemon (not so great for my growlithe or horsea, for example).

All in all, I ended up revamping my team even with a pretty poor set of wild pokemon to battle in much shorter than 24 hours, so now I just haven't been playing PWO because I'm waiting for Morty to become available again. It seems like a waste of time in a way to be battling low-reward level 14 pokemon at level 25+ for experience, as (statistically speaking) I will get more experience/hour killing the pokemon in the next area with the same amount of time/effort involved, as they are pretty much all OHKOs anyway. I understand how battling gym leaders can be exploited if the time limit is too short, but 24 hours is a huge setback for new players just trying to play the game. I'm not even very good and I exhausted all my options for the area I was in, very quickly.

Maybe give people a three-strikes system or something? Like, be forced to wait an hour after your first two losses, so that you can get three losses within 2-3 hours (which won't net you an insane amount of experience even if people did exploit it), which was honestly enough time for me to reassess my team and train them up a good bit. But if you lose three times then start bumping up the cooldowns to 24, 48 hours or whatever everyone thinks is fair, since obviously then it's just an exploiter. (Or even just a two-strikes system would be better than getting locked out for 24 hours on your first try). If you can't kill a gym leader within three tries, you aren't learning much from your previous failures x___x

Or maybe make it so that the cooldown for your FIRST loss to a gym leader is reduced. Like, instead of waiting 24 hours, you only have to wait three hours - but subsequent losses are 24 hours.

Everything seems different in PWO compared to the games, so when I go to a gym in PWO I really don't know what to expect. It's easy to be just unprepared for a gym battle due to not knowing what you're going to be up against, so a 24 hour setback for new players seems sorta harsh D:

 

[psylensse]

The issue currently is that every NPC when you first enter a battle is already marked as a loss (nice...). Hence why if the game crashes, it has it logged as you being in a battle. If someone comes up with the idea of 'well, just change that then' - it's not that simple. You'll get people abusing the NPCs by disconnecting every battle.

This to me was an interesting insight into the overarching philosophy, that justice-wise, it is preferable to nip the abusers in the bud at the expense people who may be victims of a crash. Which perhaps is completely practical from the standpoint of the people running this game. But I think someone previously mentioned just awarding all the XP at the end of a winning NPC battle and getting nothing for losing. Since the game already can keep track of how XP should be distributed amongst switched pokemon, and other basic arithmetic, would this be feasible? Otherwise, for the sake of consensus, I like the cooldown period (the "positive punishment" someone mentioned) but think it could be shorter. 2 weeks is a long wait. a couple days to me is good. Also, I think NPCs should dispense game advice and info, since you sort of are forced to talk to them anyway.

 

[CoolKnightST]

This you maybe can improve:
The trainers in Kanto (arround the first gym: Pewter City). Get way to strong ones you battle them the second time. So strong that many players just don't want to leave it to progress too Cerulean City. I understand they need to be stronger ones your out the digelett cave but why don't active their level-up than, rather than boost them straight away. My pokémon where level +/- 25 (x6). When I arrived to Cerulean. I simply rushed the game and beat the 3rth gym just because I was that strong. There is just to many stimulation to keep you pokémons there. If you keep all trainers under the gymleader level. Players probaly want to continue an lot faster. It would be smarter to let the level boost script actived ones you comes out the digelett cave to renew the trainer challenge. This improvement doens't require an lot of work so I suggest to do something about it

The second problem that I face now is afther the 3rth gym badge. I might be beter that people first do an quest so they need to explore the digelett cave before they can progress too route 12, where the horrible rare snorelax is catchable. Maybe an repare to the bridges or something. There should be an way to acces Celadon City faster because of the badge.


The last is an question. Will the trainers Red, Green, Yellow, Gold, Silver, Crystal ever be in pwo? We currently play with Brendan and May. But there are an lot other characters in the pokémon games. Since blue is already in the game why shoudn't they be add. Red was originaly add in Mr. Silver area, you maybe can put him back out there.


One last thing regarding the gym. Why don't use different characters instand of higher level scrolls:

• Brock > Brock Father (forget name)
• Misty > The 3 sisters
• Lt. Surge > Yellow
• Erika > Green
• Janine > Koga
• Sabrina > Sabrina mother (forget name)
• Blaine (tourist dressed) > Blaine
• Blue > Giovanni (could be nice to give him mewtwo)

• Falkner > Falkner father
• Bugsy > Bugsy big brother (new character idea)
• Whitney > Milton (whitney uncle)
• Morty > Morty Twin Brother (new character idea)
• Chuck > Chuck's Wife
• Jasmine > Silver
• Pryce > Crystal
• Clair > Gold

The reason why I suggest this is to make some more variantion inside the game and give the ability to put those gymleader outside the gym. For example you come from Johto you beat brock father and you can battle brock somewhere in Mt. Moon (if you have johto pass you will see him). It probaly requires an server side update so it's not possible, just write it down.