Well, considering Nurse Joy's speedy healing on Pokemon, I would like to have Pokemon keep the HP totals, as there is really no consequence in the Pokemon world to all these Pokemon battles, but trainers could well move back to stress.
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Or maybe have the mild/minor damage things apply only if the Pokemon has fainted? So if say Team Rocket shows up and starts beating Pokes when they're down, then you get dead Pokemon?
i dunno, I think keeping consequences and stress in adds some realism to the series; having pokemon take consequences can lend some battle carryover. nurse joy waving her magic wand and curing everything ever is really just a convention of the video game and a mechanical necessity
just for those who aren't familiar with fate, when taking stress you have the option to take a temporary aspect instead called a Consequence that has varying levels of severity that reduces stress taken by a set amount; the upside to these is that they allow you to keep fighting, the downside is enemies can take advantage of your injuries
The way I see the HP vs. Consequences thing is that HP is more like stamina, once you are out of it, you are exhausted and faint. Nurse Joy and items can fix that quickly. Consequences are injuries that Time can only heal, Nurse Joy might be able to help with it (Which could be shown like in the book of changing its aspect from Broken Leg to Cast on Leg) but she isn't a Miracle worker which makes sense why their are sick and injured Pokémon in her care.
The problem with going to an hp system is that you turn consequences into little more than a damage shield
stress in fate by default is meant to just be an abstract thing; that's why it wipes at the end of a conflict
But you are ignoring the fact it can still be used against you so its still more then just a soak ability and you are limited on how many times you can take it.
The problem with going to an hp system is that you turn consequences into little more than a damage shield
stress in fate by default is meant to just be an abstract thing; that's why it wipes at the end of a conflict
Aren't they anyway though?
You take a consequence and then anyone has the ability to invoke it against you, except in Fate this means risking more shift and more stress, compared to this system where it risks more HP.
Really the only difference is how much stress you can take and how granular it is. 4 Hardiness here equates to 11 HP, whereas in Fate it equates to 10 HP but divided between the 1, 2, 3 and 4 hit stress boxes.
Also, I suspect in this system that HP damage itself accumulates between battles.
But still, I don't think Pokemon should have ready access to consequences in the first place. For a start, there's the whole "Why are we letting people battle monsters to the death?" question.
And second, it makes moves like Explosion or Self-Destruct just untenable. Why would Pokemon be willing to fight if there's a large chance of permanent damage even before the other Pokemon's moves are brought into the question?
I don't really know enough about FATE to have an opinion one way or the other, but I do have a general idea for James Stone's life up 'till now.
One thing that I've always just kind of assumed about the setting is that for every proper Gym where the protagonists do battle, earn badges, etc, there's at least a dozen smaller "gyms" in various towns that are much simpler affairs to cater to the locals' needs. Jack's Dojo is one of the more successful ones and, in a few years, may even receive an invitation to join the Pokemon League as a real Gym. Assuming, of course, Jack actually remembers to keep up to date on his paperwork.
As for James, his parents are very busy with their own work (which I'm to lazy to come up with James doesn't understand), leaving Jack to look after his younger brother most of the time. So, like it or not, James was essentially forcibly enrolled in Jack's dojo. Aside from the frankly absurd time that Jack forces James to rise and shine, James enjoys the competition with the other students. And since the day that James broke another kid's nose for saying that Jack takes it easier on James because they're brothers, no one's brought up the fact that he's related to Jack at all. James is pretty glad everyone's on the same page now, because he earned a whole month of cleaning the dojo and "weekend wilderness training" for that.
James actually met Stirn during the first of that month's wilderness excursions, as he was almost boiling over with frustration and doubts. He set up camp close enough to where Stirn had settled down to meditate. James' bad vibes were so distracting that Stirn actually came over to see what was wrong. They hit it off wonderfully, and as James and Stirn trotted out of the woods behind the dojo, Jack tried to not seem too pleased that James had brought a new friend. This WAS supposed to be a punishment, after all.
Regarding player connections, I was thinking that Jack's dojo would be near enough to Littleroot Town that Gorm and James would know each other. Gorm seems rambuncious enough that he and James could have gotten into all kinds of shenanigans during their visits.
They're not damage shields though, they are the actual fictional representation of damage. The stress itself is the damage shield
Also there's nothing in the rules that establishes a fight as to the death; the stakes of a conflict are decided by the parties involved when making concessions or getting taken out
it's just as easy for everyone to agree when battling that getting taken out is just fainting. Taken out is simply a mechanical representation of being unable to continue forward in the conflict; for example if someone takes me out in a social conflict I don't up and die, I could be too flustered to continue or whatever
I'm just asking y'all to give the shot to the rules first before making big sweeping mechanics changes to no real benefit. The stress system as it is has been playtested for a couple years now and it works elegantly. Switching to HP loses some of what makes Fate a narrative/fiction based game imo
With the FATE standard system, all Pokémon Powers are equal (as it is written in FATE of the Pokemon League). Tackle and Hyper Beam do the same damage and cost the same PP and to boost it, you spend more PP. The only changes occur when you do effects and maybe Move Type. With this system, we can make a noticeable differents between moves.
HP might also be faster as we are doing more damage per hit. Someone with 4 stress boxes will require 4-6 rounds to knock out if you hit every turn (4 for the stress and 2 for consequences) while this system could take 3-5 rounds per fight.
And personally I feel its more in keeping with the video/TCG. But I'll leave it up to a vote.
actually, GG, you deal stress equal to the amount of shifts by which you exceed the target's defense roll!
the 4-6 round estimate is actually not wholly accurate; it depends on who invokes aspects and who is taking consequences. for example, not all NPCs are given slotted consequences. that being said, i probably assigned too many stress boxes by default; it should probably be 1 health box per two points of hardiness, not one for one
say i'm rolling power attribute 4 vs. speed attribute 2. assume we each roll a 0 on the dice for simplistic maths sakes, we're looking at a 4 stress hit (2 from exceeding the defense, 2 from the Weapon rating. 5 stress if my move is same-typed). if I invoke an aspect with it (or tag a consequence/maneuver) it's 7. assuming the opponent is someone of no real consequence that's more than enough to take a mook out. that's to say nothing if my move is a 3 PP move that deals +4 by default.
i would encourage everyone to just roll with the system that's been put through the wringer first and then everyone can decide if they'd like to mod it up further from there is all.
I still think that physical consequences on Pokemon is a bit meh.
I'm not opposed to the idea of carrying over damage between battles in general (and if it stays a HP system, I'd be pushing for that to be persistent up until a potion or PokeCenter is utilised), but having Pokemon take injuries during battle just rubs me the wrong way.
If you want to keep consequences, the natural compromise position for me would be to treat all consequences as mental only. So Losing Trust in the Trainer, Scared to Fight, etc, instead of Broken Arm, Blood Everywhere, WHY CAN'T I SEE?! and so on.
that's absolutely reasonable! consequences can represent any sort of trauma. like i said, the cool nature of the system is that it can be used to represent anything within the narrative. consequences are just the mechanical bits that emphasize the, well, consequences of a conflict.
a list of perfectly logical consequences: Wounded Pride, Bruised Shell, Scratched, things like that
Yeah, it's just that when you're looking to describe a minor consequence (4 stress/shift soak) in physical terms, and it can't heal until an entire scenario has played out, the things I envisage are significantly more severe than just "bruised".
moderate consequences are 4, actually. Minor are 2.
the only thing that differentiates consequences is how long they last.
you can have a Scratched consequence at Minor or Moderate and they both do the same thing; the one that's minor only lasts the rest of the scene while the moderate lasts for a session. other than that, @discrider, there's no other differentiation. does that make sense?
Well, aside from getting my head around what the various game time names are in this game, yes.
Scene is just one location? And session is like a scenario right (4/5 battles or some such until the players complete a main story objective)? Major is arc? Extreme is permanent but arc also?
The thing is, my suspension of disbelief takes a hit if your Pokemon suffers a "Scratch" and then has to deal with it healing for the next week or so in game time.
right, so, all of those terms are pretty much arbitrary. like i said, a scene is basically a point of interaction. say we just finish a battle and our Pokes have a minor consequence each on them since it was just a little spar. we each decide to take a break to the PokeCenter and grab a drink and chat it up with some other trainers. at the end of that scene at the Pokemon center our mons' minor consequences would go away. and if we're talking Moderate consequences they would probably get downgraded by the recovery at the Pokemon center to Minor. ("Your Rung Bell consequence is now Headache")
given PokeCenter healing it's not unreasonable to say they can probably get rid of Moderate consequences as well in the same amount of time. the recovery times for consequences as default are assumed if you're applying good old fashioned rest and basic first aid
Fair enough.
Still, I'd not like to see Pokemon take Moderate consequences of physical nature which are inherently exploitable after the last trip to the Pokemon Center.
It's just, what exactly are these 12 year olds witnessing? You'd almost be expecting them to take mental trauma as well with any Moderate or greater consequence inflicted on their Pokemon.
you're really over-emphasizing the nature of those consequences
just because someone takes a Moderate consequence doesn't mean they got their arm broken! if my Pokemon goes through a battle and uses up both consequence slots, they could be taken up by "A Little Dinged Up" and "Shaken Resolve" or "A Little Singed" and "Fatigued"
also Consequences aren't "exploitable" like some kind of scary monster. Once a consequence is tagged (and they have to be tagged quickly) your opposition has to pay you a Fate point to use them like any other aspect! they're like compels in that regard, actually.
so Consequences come with one free invoke like an Advantage. after that (and if they're unused when the conflict ends) they're just normal aspects. gotta spend a fate point to bring them into play.
Example Scenario:
Abra's 2 and 3 boxes are full. Squirtle hits Abra with Tackle for 2 stress; the stress at 2 is full, so it rolls up to 3. full, goes to 4. Abra, not wanting to fill up his 4th box from a piddly 2 shift hit takes a Minor Consequence, Bruise on My Noggin, to eliminate the 2 stress hit. Next turn he doesn't really do much to Squirtle (Squirtle is a tough mamma jamma) and so Squirtle smacks him again with Rapid Spin... he rolls 3 on his attack and Abra rolls 4 on the defense which is a miss. Squirtle, being clever in addition to tough, tags Bruise on my Noggin for free and now Abra takes a 1 stress hit. the consequence is now just a normal aspect like any other. if Squirtle wants to use it from here on he's gotta pony up a point to Abra.
you typically don't see folks taking Consequences until they're on the verge of being taken out. if someone rolls a really big hit for example that will roll right up off their stress track in one go.
another example:
battle is joined between Machoke and Feraligatr. Machoke goes first and decides to drop a whammy on Feraligatr. he activates his 3 PP move Mega Punch (Weapon: 4) and rolls his power +6 and gets ++00 on the roll for a total of 8. Feraligatr tries to soak the hit with Hardiness (4) and rolls 00-- for a 2. Machoke's attack is looking like a 10 shift hit which is going to roll right off Feraligatr's health track of 8, a one-hit KO, so he decides to take a minor consequence of Seeing Stars. the hit is now 8 and fills up Feraligatr's 8th stress box and he can keep fighting, albeit at a minor disadvantage because now Machoke has a free tag from Feraligatr's Seeing Stars consequence.
the other thing you want to note is that when you take consequences, if you concede, you get a Fate Point for conceding and then an additional FP for each consequence you sustained. so say in the above battle, near the end Feraligatr ends up taking a Moderate consequence in addition to his Minor. His trainer decides that if Machoke takes him out he could actually inflict some lasting harm on his Mon (here's where you might see actual injuries come in!) so he opts to concede; Feraligatr loses the battle but receives 3 Fate Points for his efforts.
I'm leaning ever so slightly towards voting the stress box method, but that's probably just because such a system is new to me and therefore I'm a bit interested in seeing it in action, and also because Arcanis is doing such a good job of selling the idea.
But I'll throw in behind whatever GG decides on, ultimately. I'm mostly here for the Pokemon and I'm content with remaining amiably ambivalent in system matters.
I'll run it with the stress track just fine, I'm mainly here to present a story. I just thought a few things would benefit from a different combat system then straight FATE just for theme reasons.
Ok, so Arcanis and I got to talking and since it doesn't seem people care to much either way, we are going with the Stress track system. I think Arcanis had some ideas and changes for character creation mechanical but for the most part your character will only need minor changes.
Really the only change would be your Pokemon starts with 3 stress boxes get one Stress box for every 2 Hardness. Then PP starts at 3 and you get 1PP for each point in Special. I think that since we are sharing all the PP for the moves vs each one getting their own, you should be able to regain one PP per turn then regain them all between battles (should you have to fight in secession.) But that's my option. If you guys want to be able to run out and have to use Struggle, then we can op out.
yeah PP like health stress would wash away during battles. you can also take consequences just like you can with health to reduce PP stress, don't forget that!
The first thing you will notice when entering Slateport City (the ninth largest city in the world) off Bicycle Route 110 from Mauville City is that everything revolves around the port. Every day massive cargo ships and cruise ships travel through there with a nearly never ending flow of people and goods. It was here where Lee Samberg was born and raised by his loving middle class parents of Mark and Lisa Samberg.
Lee’s father was sailor onboard the S.S. Tidal and sadly was not home a lot, but when his father would return from the long journeys out at sea he would tell Lee these amazing stories of pirates and Pokémon battles and storms so powerful they threat to tear the ship to pieces. Lee eyes would light up with every new tale and from a very young age dreamed of someday joining his out at sea and be a sailor too.
When Mark Samberg realized that his son’s dreams where not just childish fantasies he devoted every minute he could spare when home to teaching Lee everything there was to being a sailor, from map reading, wind and water currents, swimming, to even how to ride Tenacools.
Lee loved the times he got to spend with his father over the years but when the times came where he would have to sail away these where when Lee would feel the most alone. It was during one of these times that a curious thing happened. Lee was sitting on the beach off Route 109 minding his own when suddenly the sand at his feet began to move! Lee jumped back just in time to see a blue Pokémon with star shaped fins appeared out of the ground.
The blue little Pokémon (Lee would later learned it was a Mudkip) blinked a moment at Lee then cocked his head to one side and stared. Lee finally reached slowly into his backpack and find some crackers. After a few minutes the little blue guy grabbed the crackers and ate them. From there on in Lee and this Pokémon where together everywhere he went.
Lee worked hard to try and train Mudkip but nothing he did seemed to work. So Lee applied to become a student at the world famous Pokémon Academy. Surprising it took 6 months for him to be accepted but it finally happened and Lee Samberg is on his way to making his dreams come true.
And, @discrider, did you see what I suggested about James and Gorm?
Yep, sounds good.
Gorm was pretty much guaranteed to assail each and every young Pokemon trainer who visited Littleroot, especially if they had their Pokemon wandering around with them at the same time.
Not sure how Stirn would have dealt with all the unwarranted questions and prodding though.
Ok, so you may have noticed that PP is kinda low. That's because your Pokemon has a basic attack that uses no PP and is Typeless. Its just your Physical + Roll. And to roll Fudge Dice used in this game, you roll 4dF like so...
So lets start some world building. This is were you guys get to make up some of the things about the game world, take a bit of control of the story and set stuff up for adventures you might want to see.
So first, What does your character know about the Pokemon Academy? How did they find out about what they know?
In order to persuade her parents to let her leave the bodyguards at home, I rather like the idea that the Pokemon Academy would have some pretty potent methods of guaranteeing the safety and security of their young wards, especially given that they are to be working with Pokemon that can spit fire, have sharpened blades for limbs, there's likely rare and valuable Pokemon in the hands of inexperienced Trainers to tempt the boldest of thieves, etc, etc.
That can work twofold, in that it keeps our characters from getting into too much harm for us to handle if we play by the rules, but also forces us to counteract or avoid those measures when we want to do something risky or dangerous (definitely a "when" not "if" for that one).
To maybe hit some of those Harry Potter notes, this could be at least partially accomplished by having the teachers at the academy be impressive trainers in their own right, able to stand alongside their own Pokemon to combat the strongest of foes and willing and able to defend their students from harm that may threaten from any quarter.
Would make for some memorable NPCs, give us some fun potential role models, and of course something to measure ourselves up against, skill-wise. When our characters can start taking on the teachers in a fair fight, we'll know we have arrived.
Posts
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Or maybe have the mild/minor damage things apply only if the Pokemon has fainted? So if say Team Rocket shows up and starts beating Pokes when they're down, then you get dead Pokemon?
which i like!
stress in fate by default is meant to just be an abstract thing; that's why it wipes at the end of a conflict
But you are ignoring the fact it can still be used against you so its still more then just a soak ability and you are limited on how many times you can take it.
Aren't they anyway though?
You take a consequence and then anyone has the ability to invoke it against you, except in Fate this means risking more shift and more stress, compared to this system where it risks more HP.
Really the only difference is how much stress you can take and how granular it is. 4 Hardiness here equates to 11 HP, whereas in Fate it equates to 10 HP but divided between the 1, 2, 3 and 4 hit stress boxes.
Also, I suspect in this system that HP damage itself accumulates between battles.
But still, I don't think Pokemon should have ready access to consequences in the first place. For a start, there's the whole "Why are we letting people battle monsters to the death?" question.
And second, it makes moves like Explosion or Self-Destruct just untenable. Why would Pokemon be willing to fight if there's a large chance of permanent damage even before the other Pokemon's moves are brought into the question?
As for James, his parents are very busy with their own work (which I'm to lazy to come up with James doesn't understand), leaving Jack to look after his younger brother most of the time. So, like it or not, James was essentially forcibly enrolled in Jack's dojo. Aside from the frankly absurd time that Jack forces James to rise and shine, James enjoys the competition with the other students. And since the day that James broke another kid's nose for saying that Jack takes it easier on James because they're brothers, no one's brought up the fact that he's related to Jack at all. James is pretty glad everyone's on the same page now, because he earned a whole month of cleaning the dojo and "weekend wilderness training" for that.
James actually met Stirn during the first of that month's wilderness excursions, as he was almost boiling over with frustration and doubts. He set up camp close enough to where Stirn had settled down to meditate. James' bad vibes were so distracting that Stirn actually came over to see what was wrong. They hit it off wonderfully, and as James and Stirn trotted out of the woods behind the dojo, Jack tried to not seem too pleased that James had brought a new friend. This WAS supposed to be a punishment, after all.
Regarding player connections, I was thinking that Jack's dojo would be near enough to Littleroot Town that Gorm and James would know each other. Gorm seems rambuncious enough that he and James could have gotten into all kinds of shenanigans during their visits.
Twitch Stream
Also there's nothing in the rules that establishes a fight as to the death; the stakes of a conflict are decided by the parties involved when making concessions or getting taken out
it's just as easy for everyone to agree when battling that getting taken out is just fainting. Taken out is simply a mechanical representation of being unable to continue forward in the conflict; for example if someone takes me out in a social conflict I don't up and die, I could be too flustered to continue or whatever
I'm just asking y'all to give the shot to the rules first before making big sweeping mechanics changes to no real benefit. The stress system as it is has been playtested for a couple years now and it works elegantly. Switching to HP loses some of what makes Fate a narrative/fiction based game imo
With the FATE standard system, all Pokémon Powers are equal (as it is written in FATE of the Pokemon League). Tackle and Hyper Beam do the same damage and cost the same PP and to boost it, you spend more PP. The only changes occur when you do effects and maybe Move Type. With this system, we can make a noticeable differents between moves.
HP might also be faster as we are doing more damage per hit. Someone with 4 stress boxes will require 4-6 rounds to knock out if you hit every turn (4 for the stress and 2 for consequences) while this system could take 3-5 rounds per fight.
And personally I feel its more in keeping with the video/TCG. But I'll leave it up to a vote.
the 4-6 round estimate is actually not wholly accurate; it depends on who invokes aspects and who is taking consequences. for example, not all NPCs are given slotted consequences. that being said, i probably assigned too many stress boxes by default; it should probably be 1 health box per two points of hardiness, not one for one
say i'm rolling power attribute 4 vs. speed attribute 2. assume we each roll a 0 on the dice for simplistic maths sakes, we're looking at a 4 stress hit (2 from exceeding the defense, 2 from the Weapon rating. 5 stress if my move is same-typed). if I invoke an aspect with it (or tag a consequence/maneuver) it's 7. assuming the opponent is someone of no real consequence that's more than enough to take a mook out. that's to say nothing if my move is a 3 PP move that deals +4 by default.
I'm not opposed to the idea of carrying over damage between battles in general (and if it stays a HP system, I'd be pushing for that to be persistent up until a potion or PokeCenter is utilised), but having Pokemon take injuries during battle just rubs me the wrong way.
If you want to keep consequences, the natural compromise position for me would be to treat all consequences as mental only. So Losing Trust in the Trainer, Scared to Fight, etc, instead of Broken Arm, Blood Everywhere, WHY CAN'T I SEE?! and so on.
a list of perfectly logical consequences: Wounded Pride, Bruised Shell, Scratched, things like that
the only thing that differentiates consequences is how long they last.
you can have a Scratched consequence at Minor or Moderate and they both do the same thing; the one that's minor only lasts the rest of the scene while the moderate lasts for a session. other than that, @discrider, there's no other differentiation. does that make sense?
Scene is just one location? And session is like a scenario right (4/5 battles or some such until the players complete a main story objective)? Major is arc? Extreme is permanent but arc also?
The thing is, my suspension of disbelief takes a hit if your Pokemon suffers a "Scratch" and then has to deal with it healing for the next week or so in game time.
given PokeCenter healing it's not unreasonable to say they can probably get rid of Moderate consequences as well in the same amount of time. the recovery times for consequences as default are assumed if you're applying good old fashioned rest and basic first aid
Still, I'd not like to see Pokemon take Moderate consequences of physical nature which are inherently exploitable after the last trip to the Pokemon Center.
It's just, what exactly are these 12 year olds witnessing? You'd almost be expecting them to take mental trauma as well with any Moderate or greater consequence inflicted on their Pokemon.
just because someone takes a Moderate consequence doesn't mean they got their arm broken! if my Pokemon goes through a battle and uses up both consequence slots, they could be taken up by "A Little Dinged Up" and "Shaken Resolve" or "A Little Singed" and "Fatigued"
I may have read the entire Fate core rules end to end for the first time in one sitting, so some of these concepts are squishing together in my head.
Example Scenario:
Abra's 2 and 3 boxes are full. Squirtle hits Abra with Tackle for 2 stress; the stress at 2 is full, so it rolls up to 3. full, goes to 4. Abra, not wanting to fill up his 4th box from a piddly 2 shift hit takes a Minor Consequence, Bruise on My Noggin, to eliminate the 2 stress hit. Next turn he doesn't really do much to Squirtle (Squirtle is a tough mamma jamma) and so Squirtle smacks him again with Rapid Spin... he rolls 3 on his attack and Abra rolls 4 on the defense which is a miss. Squirtle, being clever in addition to tough, tags Bruise on my Noggin for free and now Abra takes a 1 stress hit. the consequence is now just a normal aspect like any other. if Squirtle wants to use it from here on he's gotta pony up a point to Abra.
another example:
battle is joined between Machoke and Feraligatr. Machoke goes first and decides to drop a whammy on Feraligatr. he activates his 3 PP move Mega Punch (Weapon: 4) and rolls his power +6 and gets ++00 on the roll for a total of 8. Feraligatr tries to soak the hit with Hardiness (4) and rolls 00-- for a 2. Machoke's attack is looking like a 10 shift hit which is going to roll right off Feraligatr's health track of 8, a one-hit KO, so he decides to take a minor consequence of Seeing Stars. the hit is now 8 and fills up Feraligatr's 8th stress box and he can keep fighting, albeit at a minor disadvantage because now Machoke has a free tag from Feraligatr's Seeing Stars consequence.
the other thing you want to note is that when you take consequences, if you concede, you get a Fate Point for conceding and then an additional FP for each consequence you sustained. so say in the above battle, near the end Feraligatr ends up taking a Moderate consequence in addition to his Minor. His trainer decides that if Machoke takes him out he could actually inflict some lasting harm on his Mon (here's where you might see actual injuries come in!) so he opts to concede; Feraligatr loses the battle but receives 3 Fate Points for his efforts.
But I'll throw in behind whatever GG decides on, ultimately. I'm mostly here for the Pokemon and I'm content with remaining amiably ambivalent in system matters.
And, @discrider, did you see what I suggested about James and Gorm?
Twitch Stream
The first thing you will notice when entering Slateport City (the ninth largest city in the world) off Bicycle Route 110 from Mauville City is that everything revolves around the port. Every day massive cargo ships and cruise ships travel through there with a nearly never ending flow of people and goods. It was here where Lee Samberg was born and raised by his loving middle class parents of Mark and Lisa Samberg.
Lee’s father was sailor onboard the S.S. Tidal and sadly was not home a lot, but when his father would return from the long journeys out at sea he would tell Lee these amazing stories of pirates and Pokémon battles and storms so powerful they threat to tear the ship to pieces. Lee eyes would light up with every new tale and from a very young age dreamed of someday joining his out at sea and be a sailor too.
When Mark Samberg realized that his son’s dreams where not just childish fantasies he devoted every minute he could spare when home to teaching Lee everything there was to being a sailor, from map reading, wind and water currents, swimming, to even how to ride Tenacools.
Lee loved the times he got to spend with his father over the years but when the times came where he would have to sail away these where when Lee would feel the most alone. It was during one of these times that a curious thing happened. Lee was sitting on the beach off Route 109 minding his own when suddenly the sand at his feet began to move! Lee jumped back just in time to see a blue Pokémon with star shaped fins appeared out of the ground.
The blue little Pokémon (Lee would later learned it was a Mudkip) blinked a moment at Lee then cocked his head to one side and stared. Lee finally reached slowly into his backpack and find some crackers. After a few minutes the little blue guy grabbed the crackers and ate them. From there on in Lee and this Pokémon where together everywhere he went.
Lee worked hard to try and train Mudkip but nothing he did seemed to work. So Lee applied to become a student at the world famous Pokémon Academy. Surprising it took 6 months for him to be accepted but it finally happened and Lee Samberg is on his way to making his dreams come true.
Yep, sounds good.
Gorm was pretty much guaranteed to assail each and every young Pokemon trainer who visited Littleroot, especially if they had their Pokemon wandering around with them at the same time.
Not sure how Stirn would have dealt with all the unwarranted questions and prodding though.
Geth roll 4dF for FATE Test
So first, What does your character know about the Pokemon Academy? How did they find out about what they know?
That can work twofold, in that it keeps our characters from getting into too much harm for us to handle if we play by the rules, but also forces us to counteract or avoid those measures when we want to do something risky or dangerous (definitely a "when" not "if" for that one).
To maybe hit some of those Harry Potter notes, this could be at least partially accomplished by having the teachers at the academy be impressive trainers in their own right, able to stand alongside their own Pokemon to combat the strongest of foes and willing and able to defend their students from harm that may threaten from any quarter.
Would make for some memorable NPCs, give us some fun potential role models, and of course something to measure ourselves up against, skill-wise. When our characters can start taking on the teachers in a fair fight, we'll know we have arrived.