I’m firmly against turn-based combat in PMU if it functioned like PMD, purely because PMD takes SO LONG when there are multiple enemies to get through a turn. If you add something like PMD where you have to wait for each enemy to take its turn, no matter what this dungeon gives you it will not be worth it. You’re subjecting 4 players to, probably, a dungeon that will take them multiple hours if all enemies worked like this. Nothing we have in the game right now is worth that amount of effort unless you wanna give each player 2 boxes and fill the those boxes with globes, gems and crystals only.
Taking a look at Shiren, that’s an interesting concept, where the game can, theoretically, move as fast as you and your party can play, until you get into a sticky situation and have to call out. It may also encourage sticking together in the dungeon so nobody runs off and dies on their own.
I think something turn-based, so long as the game doesn’t focus on each enemy’s move for very long and it doesn’t feel awful because nobody can do anything while they’re waiting, might be okay.
We are all here because we like PMD, yes, but I fear that turn-based dungeons would encourage the solo-speedrunning problem we have even more.
I think the Restore Power thing is absolutely genius. Make the revs that spawn only team-heals, in order to force good RNG and being extremely skilled if you want to run alone.
In the sense that: There are 18 types, if there are 100 floors with 1 boss every 10 floors, you’re facing 10 bosses, with 4 Pokemon in your party, assuming none of them have any supporting moves, you can carry a total of up to 16 types.
7 types are needed to clear the whole type chart with some exceptions:
- Ground is a mandatory pick to hit electric, also hits fire, poison and steel.
- Fighting is a mandatory pick to hit normal, also hits dark, rock, ice and steel.
- Flying lets you hit bug and fighting.
- Ice lets you hit grass, ground, flying and dragon. After these 4 typings you have most things covered.
- Electric OR Grass. Only needed to hit water.
- Dark OR Ghost. Only needed to hit ghost and psychic.
- Poison OR Steel. Only needed to hit fairy.
Freeze Dry can also be used to hit water, dropping electric/grass for hitting it.
(Taken from this reddit post )
Basically, between 4 Pokemon, you’re likely to have a support (C9 or Weather Setter to override weather) and then the rest would have to be carries if you wanna be careful. Perhaps you can load your Altaria with Fly and EQ to give it some utility. Among the rest of your crew, you should have those 7 types for coverage. If you lose a Pokemon that has a unique type move on it, though, suddenly you’re losing that coverage and have to pray that none of the types that come up are ones you can’t cover anymore because you lost a Pokemon.
(This is assuming that each boss has Wonder Guard and a normal health bar as per the original post, so f-killing it is not a viable strategy.)
Could be extra evil and throw in a Sableye or Spiritomb for the Dark and/or Ghost floors, making players have to carry Fairy Moves on them.
In the same sense as above, I think only being able to bring your leader is a bad idea, because it encourages running the same couple of Pokemon.
I think resetting moves is the worst idea possible because the main gimmick of the dungeon is strategizing around bringing type coverage due to all bosses having Wonder Guard, meaning you’ll want to pre-plan your moves before entering the dungeon.
As for orbs, staves/wands, etc. we could lock it to no items, and spawn those limitedly in the dungeon. Perhaps the dungeon has its own currency and is very rogue-lite. Where the main thing you get in the dungeon is currency, which is used to buy stuff like slumber/petrify orbs from a shop, as well as team revs and that sort of ish.
Having a currency for this dungeon could also assist a looplet system where each run you collect more of this currency very similarly to DDD, DS, and the Tanren Underground, for rewards outside of the dungeon.
You can bring this currency out of the dungeon each time, but never back into it. Each run you start from nothing outside of the looplets you’ve upgraded using the currency you got from your prior runs, making a clear progression system that makes the dungeon technically easier each time you run it.
This, however, creates a problem where people can begin to ‘carry’ others through the progression system of the dungeon once they have really good looplets, and I’m unsure if looplet boosts should be able to be traded or not. Perhaps a way to fix this would be that these looplet boosts are leveled, and the party is locked to the lowest leveled person’s looplet. So if you have “level 3” boosts unlocked, but your friend only has “level 1” boosts unlocked, you get downgraded to level 1 boosts for the run as to prevent cheesing.
Alternatively, it’d be interesting if every 10 floors there was an option to leave with the items you’ve gotten in the dungeon so far, and you weren’t meant to complete it your first run through. Like if upgrading your looplet was almost necessary for eventual dungeon completion, making it a truely roguelite dungeon.
This also means that, let’s say there are 10 looplet boost levels, you start at level 1, and its normal to get to Boss 1 on your first run. You escape the dungeon, check out what loot and currency you got, go to the looplet guy, get your boosts, run it again. Clear boss 1, leave dungeon, upgrade looplet, you get to level 2 this time, yay. Run it again, get to boss 2 this time, repeat, level up, finally get to the end for a MASSIVE reward… and your looplet resets.
I would also like to add that there should be a system where players get a certain amount of currency each for beating certain levels of the dungeon. After Boss 1, each person gets the same amount of currency in a sort of ‘end room’. This prevents (for the most part) arguing over who gets to pick up the currency because everybody gets their own currency and meets up after. Also prevents complaints like we get for Rupi and Royal Gems where its way too difficult to get. This dungeon should be handing out currency like candy and set reasonable prices for its upgrades and other purchasable treasures. I could even see stuff like where the shard shop allows you to buy an Exp All, grinding this dungeon could be another method of obtaining high-value items just from the currency alone.
I don’t know what the massive reward should be, this dungeon has turned into a concept that would take, maybe a few hours, to perhaps a week or two of logging on for a few hours, grinding it with friends, getting off for the night or doing something else, going to bed, getting up, logging back on, grinding it again. Perhaps a shiny of choice outside of like, rare spawns, unobtainable pokemon, and starters. Idk how that item would be programmed in though, perhaps a modified sparkle token? I think the item should also be undroppable so it doesn’t tank the shiny market. I also suggest it super hesitantly, but it would be a good, guaranteed method to get just about any more common shiny without tanking the rarity of rarer shinies.
Another idea is EXP Crystals. Upon beating the dungeon, you get exp crystals a-la Sword and Shield/Scarlet and Violet. This makes up for not gaining exp in the dungeon and also lets you level up your Pokemon and continue to progress outside of the dungeon while you’re doing the dungeon. Alternatively, Exp Crystals could be offered in the shop using the currency the dungeon drops. I think doing one dungeon for a week- even two- should be enough to get a mon from 1 to 100 if its the ONLY loot at the end.
Alternatively, or perhaps additionally if part of the reward is Exp Candies (not enough to get to 100 obviously but still exp candies), there could be dungeon-exclusive boxes (kind of like the grand box) with event tokens, crystals, gems, globes, HC currency, etc… Might be a good idea since its a similar thing to weekly events where you spend tons of time grinding to get a reward. Weekly events are passive, where you log in every week and do 1 thing to get your tokens, whereas this would be an active grind loop that, ideally, takes less time to run if you’re putting some time in daily, and is like, actually playing the game. as opposed to just waiting.
I’m sure there’s more that could be done here, but these are the ideas I’ve got so far. I forget who mentioned a roguelike dungeon to me before, but this kind of feels like an expansion upon their idea.
