Rarities: A 5th tier? :O

[EcoWOLFrb]

I've noticed that there is a big problem with what people consider valuable, and how they perceive value here. Currently unless a pokemon is absolutely amazing it's really not worth much, and this is because the market is saturated with shinies, and Epics. Why would someone pay a decent price for a good, but not unbelievable pokemon when there are tons of epics out there. I see regular Dragonites out there, which are perfectly capable battlers being cast aside, unwanted... being sold to noobs for 400k. What's wrong with this picture? Are such great battlers really so easy to catch that they can be so selective? Shouldn't what is arguable the most desirable and prestigious pokemon be a bit more revered than that?

My conclusion is that it's too easy to find HRs, and quite possibly VRs as well. I also think that some rares and VRs have been misplaced. How do we solve this problem? Simply increase every appearance rate for VRs, and HRs, or do we do something more drastic? I suggest implementing a rarity higher than HR, and including only around 5-6 select pokemon... highly coveted pokemon that people will hunt no matter how rare they may be. And supplement those hunting spots with decent VRs (or the future equivalent) to keep peoples mouths wet while hunting. Here's why I think another rarity is necessary:
-Simply increasing current HRs appearance rate wouldn't really change anything, since people will still associate HR with their current understanding of it.
-It would give a breath of fresh air to hunters, a goal of getting a taste of something even more challenging.
-The current rarities have too much variance, some things are obviously much much harder to find than others (compare Eevee to Sneasel). That bridge should be less wide, another rarity would give an opportunity to easily make less of a gap in all the rarities, and to keep it similar for all pokemon within a particular group.

Another thing that bothers me is that there ARE S HRs out there. In my opinion S HR should be a pipedream, something all but unobtainable... yet there are so many of them. All you have to do for proof of this is look at dovee's account (not to throw him into the lions den or anything). My current understanding is that rarities should be determined by two things: Desirability, and battle potential (While somethings are given to noobs like common horsea, magikarp, tentacool, and rare gengar, and arcanine). I believe that the best battlers, who don't need to be shiny to do well in battle SHOULDN'T have shiny versions with in game ivs as a possibility! Shiny ivs are good for pokemon who can't battle well if they didn't have those ivs, but they don't belong on pseudo legendary's and such.

Anyway, here's my suggestion with a few examples of the type of pokemon I'd like to see in each category:
Common: things like rats and bats, along with some of the better commons you see today like mankey, magikarp ect. (things to give the noobs, nothing really cool)
Rare: Horsea, Mareep, ponyta, Abra, onix, teddy (some things can have some use in battle, but nothing amazing. These should be desired, but not heavily)
VR: Arcanine, Gengar, Marill, Miltank, Gligar, Pikachu, Pinsir, Shellder, skarmory, cubone (this is either pretty great in battle, or fairly collectible)
HR: Scyther, Tauros, Starmie, Elekid, Magby, Kangaskhan, Houndour (awesome pokemon, battle worthy without being shiny, and very popular)
5th rarity (unbelievably rare?): Dratini, Bagon, Eevee, Snorlax, Larvitar, Heracross (up for discussion, these pokemon should be even higher rates than snorlax was, they will be prized above all else and they should reflect that prestige)

 

[Saurus]

In my opinion. The market is suffering. I've seen players sell their horribly rare pokemon for less than 100K just to grab the attention of a buyer. I think where the union room is concerned there should be 3 floors. One for very rare traders. One for horribly rare traders. One for shiny traders. I dunno, just my input. But the market is just ridiculous IMHO.

 

[Gobfather]

The market is scarce of actually GOOD pokemon, and getting your own takes way too long as it is. These dragos getting sold for 400k, simply suck, and sure are "passable" in battle, but they allow from newcomers to enter the scene of pvp and start from a good and even then its less than fair chance. The way you paint this picture of how pwo should be, i feel might draw a giant line from the rich and the poor(mostly old players will have everything and the new players will have a hard time matching up), and pave the road to success here millions of miles longer. Getting HRs is plenty hard enough eco. A shiny HR is something that less than 99.99% of the community will ever see without buying (which in itself is still an outrageously small number). You use Dovee as an example, he has been for a long time and has worked very hard for what he has(not to mention donated outrageous amounts), those are just his rewards of his efforts. I myself will spend a week giving only the time I can offer, and I will be lucky if I manage to even find one dragonair / dratini at all. I do not understand why anyone would wish to extend that period to a month (Aside from protecting their own pokemon and their own wealth). Pwo is deffinetly hard enough as is to obtain uber dragonites.

****As for entertaining the idea. This new rarity could be on to something else that I would like to see ingame. Including this new rarity for token store pokes and UO pokemon. Imagine starters held in safari in this new rarity, its hard enough to find at all to not hurt the draw there is to buying one, yet obtainable to those lucky players. Say UO pokemon like snover, relincanth, anorith held at this rarity. Including pokemon like absol, aron, trapinch as well ingame at this rarity, as well as some that were HR before, snorlax. I like and dislike this idea, I fear it may have reprocusions making certain pokes too hard to find, and too expensibe ingame, but some pokes added to it may be a great idea. Especially as new pokemon arrive to pwo, example pokemon like garchomp so easily obtainable, should be considered to this new rarity. I just feel that keeping the same pokemon ingame and rearranging the rarity, is not something that benefits anyone aside from the rich, but adding things in meanwhile rearranging is a very good idea.

 

[pokearcanine]

the idea seems cool,but i guess pokes in game should keep their rarity,and for the new rarity ones,i suggest adding pokes that arent in game or token store yet,example:sinnoh starters or maybe some of the UOs we have,that would make people hunt for these pokes and those pokes would be worth a lot

 

[EcoWOLFrb]

The market is scarce of actually GOOD pokemon, and getting your own takes way too long as it is.

Who says they take too long? I've seen people get multiple amazing pokemon in 6 months. This is an MMO, people are supposed to play for a long time, and work for nice things. And just about everyone I know and speak to has, or has had several very epic HRs, there are a LOT of good pokemon to go around. People have lost the concept of signature pokemon because everyone has several amazing pokemon that has been playing for even a short amount of time.

These dragos getting sold for 400k, simply suck, and sure are "passable" in battle, but they allow from newcomers to enter the scene of pvp and start from a good and even then its less than fair chance.

I know I could go out and get a pretty usable dragonite for 1m or so. My point is that it should be the norm for people to use average dragonites and rare pokemon like it... why is it that there's 100 battlers out there with uber-epic dragonites and metagross and jolteons? That should be so much more prestigious than it is. Prestige = goals for noobs... that's what attracts them

The way you paint this picture of how pwo should be, i feel might draw a giant line from the rich and the poor(mostly old players will have everything and the new players will have a hard time matching up), and pave the road to success here millions of miles longer.

We cannot stop progress just because it would give an advantage to some people, that's not what this conversation is about. Eventually everyone quits playing, and their pokemon will go with them, or get divided to all their friends.

You use Dovee as an example, he has been for a long time and has worked very hard for what he has(not to mention donated outrageous amounts), those are just his rewards of his efforts.

Just wanna correct you here, dovee doesn't really donate a lot. While he has worked hard and put in the hours, again we're deviating from the point. The point is not that he's worked hard for them, but rather that half of those pokemon shouldn't exist at all. Sure, someone might get lucky once a year and find a S HR, the numbers will allow for that outlier every so often, but why is it that there are 3 S Dragonites, 3 S Salamences, 2 S Lapras ect. Not only the active ones, but the ones on banned accounts and inactive accounts prove that it happens far too often.

Now let's move on to the constructive portion of your post. I REALLY like the idea of having only in game pokemon that are highly desired. These extra rare pokemon shouldn't be in the token store, you're completely correct... it would create more balance between donators and non-donators to have the best pokemon in gens 1-2 in game only. However I really disagree with implementing pokemon not native to Johto and Kanto... bad idea. We need a realistic approach to this, and I like that they want to wait for Hoenn to add those pokemon in game, at which point they'll probably put the next gen pokemon in the token store. There needs to be some things that you can't get in game in the token store to appeal to people more.

The issue I personally have with your general attitude is that it seems like (and correct me if I'm wrong) you think that if they're taking away one aspect you need to be compensated with something to make up for the damages. If they take the best pokemon in game and make them harder to get, then you want more, better pokemon to be added to make up for it. If something is being done for the good of the game, and will help more players become heavily involved with the game then there's no need for compensation, it has it's own reasons and can stand alone without support. Starters would be one thing, but adding pokemon that don't belong in game just for the hell of it... disagree.

So new idea to add on to my topic: Take the pokemon that are in the new rarity, and remove them from the token store entirely. The token store needs to be redone anyway, it's outdated.

 

[Nikola]

2 years ago people were impressed with a shiny rare. Anything more then that was a very rare sight. I remember who had Cloyster or Tauros was very famous and people were talking about them all days. Couldn't wait myself to have a battle with them. With the time those things slowly started to fade away. We have less people interested in community then before so does players online. Some believed that the economy is reaching equilibrium, who knows...probably did at some point. However those tiers never changed much. Most of the Pokemon are the same rare like they were 2 years ago. It's a fault of the economy id say.

-There are some Pokemon that are extremely hard to find. Take shiny Wobbafat style Pokemon. I have a feeling that Wobbafat might be the most unique pokemon on the server, shiny and catchable of course. We don't have much on our plate Id say. I don't have anything against current rarity system if its going to be revised. I would rather focus on upgrading something what is going to server well for long runs. While looking at fully developed battle engine I can see many pokemon being used. Some of them will become non competitive if we ever get proper battle engine. Funny thing is, most of the common battlers used lately will become impotent...dead and cold meat, barely doing what it takes...

-I also see a lot of people having passing interest for a certain pokemon and satisfaction on short runs. The best example would the Halloween event. People got distracted with many pokemon while there is probably one that can be used. I believe that current rarity system at least should be revised. If I am not wrong, I think that every current tier have sub-tiers (easy HR and hard HR and so on...)Maybe we can locate the issue there? Why there would be more shiny Dragonites and Snorlaxes then some shiny VRs? They might be from token store but they go in the game right after and they circulate. This way or another it will be payed for them.

-The categories you suggested are interesting. There are several Pokemon I can't see being in a certain tier. Both Gengar and Growlithe would go in a hard common tier. Marril and Pikachu are more rare to me then a VR...Tauros should be in easy VR bracket while I see Starmie being in a hard VR Bracket, this way or another they would be VR. Pretty much like now. Some pokemon are just meh to be more rare and it gives a bad image for a pokemon gaem. I agree with Dragonite, Eevee and Larvitar for 5th tier while I see Snorlax and Kangaskam as easy hr. Everything else is pretty much ok. Just my 2 cents.

 

[EcoWOLFrb]

Well the actual pokemon chosen for each rarity is immaterial, it's more the concept I'd like to focus on.

Part of the reason you see such a big difference between 2 years ago and right now is that there is an unbalance between in-going and out-going pokemon. People just leave their stuff to their friends when they leave. Although the botting problem is not as bad as it used to be there are still too many pokemon being caught. There is nothing you can do about this but make it harder to get good pokemon. People might cry foul, saying that would make the game too hard, but obviously currently it's too easy. Like you said, before when someone had 2 S VRs it was a big deal, now it's a common sight.