It's honestly such a shame Alt Runs are ruined

[Archon]

Alt Runs used to be one of my favorite things to do in MMO. If I had a free weekend I could play through Kanto or Hoenn in about 5 or 6 hours. It was always fun to relive childhood memories and also have the added benefit of netting about 1 mil to spend on comps or whatever else I needed. 

 

Nowadays there's a level cap, a lot of items are untradeable, and battle animations are slow as shit. It makes playing through the regions not fun at all.

 

I've heard the justification that "it gives the game a new challenge" or whatever, but I'm not buying it. Pokemon has never been a really difficult game. All you have to do is just grind levels. But now, instead of just having a couple Pokes dominate, you need to grind 6 to stand a chance against the gyms/e4 with the harsh level cap. Or conversely, you just use a bunch of cheese and hack your way to the end - neither one being enjoyable. Having a level cap just ostracizes players like me from playing the game the way I want to play. If someone wants to play through the game with 6 shitty mons, a level cap won't mean anything to them.

 

And it's not like alt runs were super easy in the first place. In order to be efficient in grinding money, you needed to know where every item was, where every trainer worth fighting was, etc. You needed a speedrun-like route and laser-like precision.

 

I understand that there is little to be done now about going fully back to actually enjoyable alt runs, but there can still be changes made. First, having a battle animations toggle for PVE would be great. It would make grinding a little more tolerable. Secondly, why did items have to become untradeable in the first place? Surely constricting new items' entry into the economy was more harmful for it than letting items be traded freely. Finally, I understand that the level cap will not go away now that its in place, but maybe there can be compromises made, like raising it or being able to toggle it.

 

Now I just have this cognitive dissonance when I want to play through a Pokemon game. Why would I play an actual copy when I can play on MMO and grind money and items, and maybe find a shiny? However, playing through a region on MMO now sucks and is not a fun time. 

 

What a shame.

 

Spoiler

I know this post is very melodramatic, but what can ya do

 

[pachima]

47 minutes ago, Archon said:

Pokemon has never been a really difficult game.

Go play Pokemon mystery dungeon 2 and tell me how many times you got rekted.

[Zymogen]

Yes

[BoltBlades12]

2 hours ago, pachima said:

Go play Pokemon mystery dungeon 2 and tell me how many times you got rekted.

I think he was referring to the main games and not the spinoffs. Because man Darkrai in PMD EOS was a pain in the ass.

[Bilburt]

shut up boomer

[BoltBlades12]

1 hour ago, Bilburt said:

shut up boomer

No u

[TeamRocketHarry]

Something something help prep for endgame PvP something something economy

[calidubstep]

8 hours ago, pachima said:

Go play Pokemon mystery dungeon 2 and tell me how many times you got rekted.

It’s honestly not hard just spam x eye seeds on any relevant boss 

[razimove]

9 hours ago, Archon said:

Alt Runs used to be one of my favorite things to do in MMO. If I had a free weekend I could play through Kanto or Hoenn in about 5 or 6 hours. It was always fun to relive childhood memories and also have the added benefit of netting about 1 mil to spend on comps or whatever else I needed. 

 

Nowadays there's a level cap, a lot of items are untradeable, and battle animations are slow as shit. It makes playing through the regions not fun at all.

 

I've heard the justification that "it gives the game a new challenge" or whatever, but I'm not buying it. Pokemon has never been a really difficult game. All you have to do is just grind levels. But now, instead of just having a couple Pokes dominate, you need to grind 6 to stand a chance against the gyms/e4 with the harsh level cap. Or conversely, you just use a bunch of cheese and hack your way to the end - neither one being enjoyable. Having a level cap just ostracizes players like me from playing the game the way I want to play. If someone wants to play through the game with 6 shitty mons, a level cap won't mean anything to them.

 

And it's not like alt runs were super easy in the first place. In order to be efficient in grinding money, you needed to know where every item was, where every trainer worth fighting was, etc. You needed a speedrun-like route and laser-like precision.

 

I understand that there is little to be done now about going fully back to actually enjoyable alt runs, but there can still be changes made. First, having a battle animations toggle for PVE would be great. It would make grinding a little more tolerable. Secondly, why did items have to become untradeable in the first place? Surely constricting new items' entry into the economy was more harmful for it than letting items be traded freely. Finally, I understand that the level cap will not go away now that its in place, but maybe there can be compromises made, like raising it or being able to toggle it.

 

Now I just have this cognitive dissonance when I want to play through a Pokemon game. Why would I play an actual copy when I can play on MMO and grind money and items, and maybe find a shiny? However, playing through a region on MMO now sucks and is not a fun time. 

 

What a shame.

 

  Reveal hidden contents

I know this post is very melodramatic, but what can ya do

 

@RysPicz @Parke

[Solist]

As someone that grew up with these games, knowing them like the back of my hand, I very much appreciate the additional difficuly and limitations. Not being able to sweep the story with Starmie and co relaxes my min-max mentality, opening the door for being creative with whatever comes my way; decent wild catches, GTL bargains, using competitively shitty TM's (Rock Tomb saves lives), etc. I often end up with a weird team of cheap semi comps that are perfectly capable of completing the story by beating most of its trainers, having to grind only a level or 3 for the E4 (which now also heals your team after each win). Any serious grinding I have to do to can be attributed to my own mistakes composing a functioning team.

 

I brought a team of fresh comps a few times, mostly because I wanted to see how fast I can run through the story. I would not do this for money though (perhaps I'm doing something wrong). I'm basically sitting out scenario's that I already know will happen, aka mashing buttons. Riding the bike properly is the most challenging part.

 

I also don't care too much about the untradable items. Considering alt runs imply you have a main, you have plenty of better alternatives to generate money. In my opinion, alt runs are mostly for laidback casual plays. They still generate some easy valuables for your main (never had them net 1m though!), but also protecting the overal MMO economy.

[Malorne]

Yeah, no. alt runs have been abused waaay too much. You can easily steamroll the storyline of all available regions in a weekend if you really commit to it and know what u're doing, so i dont really see why its a struggle. To me, this just looks like an excuse of saying "yo, make alt runs easier so i can grind more cash. also nostalgia, thats more important"

[razimove]

20 minutes ago, Malorne said:

Yeah, no. alt runs have been abused waaay too much. You can easily steamroll the storyline of all available regions in a weekend if you really commit to it and know what u're doing, so i dont really see why its a struggle. To me, this just looks like an excuse of saying "yo, make alt runs easier so i can grind more cash. also nostalgia, thats more important"

Berries were abused for longer, and destroyed the economy. At least alt run, most of cash came from selling rhe items between players, not generating new money influx. But yeah, I used to do hoenn while watching a movie in 4/5 hours for 1.2-1.4m cash, was best farming method back in the good days, some did it more than a hundred times which imo is quite an achievement.

[Akshit]

Finished all 3 regions on my main alt in around 2 days, was real easy, though yeah wasn't really good use of time if we're talking about monetary profit. Could have probably made more doing payday pickup or something else.

[Archon]

10 hours ago, Malorne said:

Yeah, no. alt runs have been abused waaay too much. You can easily steamroll the storyline of all available regions in a weekend if you really commit to it and know what u're doing, so i dont really see why its a struggle. To me, this just looks like an excuse of saying "yo, make alt runs easier so i can grind more cash. also nostalgia, thats more important"

You can grind a mil doing gym runs with an amulet coin in probably half the time it would take to run hoenn when alt runs were fast. Alt runs would not be the most efficient source of income if they were completely reverted.

[ZoroarkH]

22 hours ago, pachima said:

Go play Pokemon mystery dungeon 2 and tell me how many times you got rekted.

its easy if you pick the right starters

[TheChampionMike]

First of all let me start this off by saying the alt runs will most likely never return. Not like the ones before 2016 or whenever everything changed. 

 

23 hours ago, Archon said:

Alt Runs used to be one of my favorite things to do in MMO. If I had a free weekend I could play through Kanto or Hoenn in about 5 or 6 hours. It was always fun to relive childhood memories and also have the added benefit of netting about 1 mil to spend on comps or whatever else I needed. 

Same here. I have probably alt ran Kanto around 30-50 times (I know rookie numbers xd) and got very efficient at it so I would consider myself to be at least known on the subject of alt running. 

 

23 hours ago, Archon said:

Nowadays there's a level cap, a lot of items are untradeable, and battle animations are slow as shit. It makes playing through the regions not fun at all.

A level cap was introduced to actually make the story interactive. And yes, teach the new players the basics of Pokemon. Which the handhelds fail to do the majority of the time. Making items untradeable I'll get into later. And I personally find the battle animations argument to be extremely poor. Just because the game back then was far less complete than it is now has nothing to do with anything. This would've happened regardless.

 

23 hours ago, Archon said:

I've heard the justification that "it gives the game a new challenge" or whatever, but I'm not buying it. Pokemon has never been a really difficult game. All you have to do is just grind levels. But now, instead of just having a couple Pokes dominate, you need to grind 6 to stand a chance against the gyms/e4 with the harsh level cap. Or conversely, you just use a bunch of cheese and hack your way to the end - neither one being enjoyable. Having a level cap just ostracizes players like me from playing the game the way I want to play. If someone wants to play through the game with 6 shitty mons, a level cap won't mean anything to them.

First of all, it does give the game a new challenge. As it is literally different than the handhelds thus being new. And I agree with Pokemon never being a difficult game but this is also because the handhelds are designed around very young kids. Fire Red for example is literally rated E for Everyone. As PokeMMO technically isn't allowed to be played under the age of 13 without parental consent and thus imo the difficulty is easily justified. Holding down 1 button with your starter until the end of the game isn't interactive gameplay, while I acknowledge this is very subjective, it also kind of ruins the immersion of the majority of the game. Being the story. While both might sound very unenjoyable to you whether it be piss easy like it was or in the situation that it is now. The situation now at least makes players think about what to do in a battle instead of just holding down Surf with their 25 level higher Blastoise than the E4s Ace. 

 

23 hours ago, Archon said:

And it's not like alt runs were super easy in the first place. In order to be efficient in grinding money, you needed to know where every item was, where every trainer worth fighting was, etc. You needed a speedrun-like route and laser-like precision.

I had trouble wording myself correctly so I do apologize if I sound confusing. The amount of money you end with from alt running was around the same range no matter how quick or slow you were. And while I agree that in a MMO optimized strategies should be rewarded, alt running is just a different story. Because yes, while you as somebody who can clear Kanto in 6hrs obviously gets a better yen/hour out of it. The end result of finishing an alt run stays the same. And this is where in my opinion comes in the biggest factor as to why alt runs got changed. The items. It never really was about the amount of money you could get from it, it was never about how quick you could finish the story. It was the amount of exclusive items you pumped into the market. It doesn't matter if you finished in 6hrs or 24hrs. In both cases you ended up putting in EXP Shares, PP Ups/Maxes, Amulet Coins etc. into the game. To the point where those items became very invaluable. I remember specifically PP Up/Max losing a lot of value, same as EXP Shares and TMs(this was before they were available in the Marts) as well if I recall correctly. And especially when PP Up/Max and those other healing items were made obtainable in other ways this was just not healthy as it just discarded that feature of making them. 

 

On 11/7/2019 at 5:48 PM, Archon said:

First, having a battle animations toggle for PVE would be great. It would make grinding a little more tolerable. Secondly, why did items have to become untradeable in the first place? Surely constricting new items' entry into the economy was more harmful for it than letting items be traded freely. Finally, I understand that the level cap will not go away now that its in place, but maybe there can be compromises made, like raising it or being able to toggle it.

Regarding the battle animations. Not much can be done as you're playing on a server. Even if you would be able to turn off the animation it would still need to take the same amount of time as when you have it turned on. Because someone will have it turned on. I hope this is pretty straight forward as my English is top kek.

 

Regarding items refer to above. I would agree with you as pumping in pure yen into a game at a large amount is bad. Which is why Berries were such a problem for such a long time. But like I mentioned above another way of obtaining the majority of the items that you get from the story was created and thus the untradeable thing was necessary.

 

And lastly I don't think that will ever happen. Not because I think it is necessarily a bad idea but mostly because it wouldn't do much to the game. And it would just be the go to option for everything to not have a level cap and just go back to braindead starter spamming. 

 

tl;dr: ok boomer.

[fredrichnietze]

alt runs were seen as a sign of a flawed game. for a while things could only be gotten form alt runs and when those things were implemented the balance should e "its easier to get them without alt running". rather then doing that they made alt runs progressively harder to do and less profitable. what you want to do or how you want to do it doesnt factor in the decision.

 

appearance of balance>>>>>>>balance

Edited November 8 by fredrichnietze
also hi ds o/ i see ya lurking

[MightyBoxer]

Quote

You can grind a mil doing gym runs with an amulet coin in probably half the time it would take to run hoenn when alt runs were fast. Alt runs would not be the most efficient source of income if they were completely reverted.

Maybe not.it takes me under 14hours to collect all items and beat all trainers who give 800$ per poke in all 3 regions.

The reward is about 215k/hour.I do 300k/hour with gyms.

If all items were tradable again maybe the money/hour would be better than gyms.

 

Quote

I had trouble wording myself correctly so I do apologize if I sound confusing. The amount of money you end with from alt running was around the same range no matter how quick or slow you were. And while I agree that in a MMO optimized strategies should be rewarded, alt running is just a different story. Because yes, while you as somebody who can clear Kanto in 6hrs obviously gets a better yen/hour out of it. The end result of finishing an alt run stays the same. And this is where in my opinion comes in the biggest factor as to why alt runs got changed. The items. It never really was about the amount of money you could get from it, it was never about how quick you could finish the story. It was the amount of exclusive items you pumped into the market. It doesn't matter if you finished in 6hrs or 24hrs. In both cases you ended up putting in EXP Shares, PP Ups/Maxes, Amulet Coins etc. into the game. To the point where those items became very invaluable

i dont agree.in 2016 most items i sold on gtl from story runs were almost always around same price.amuletcoin at 40k.expshare at 70k.

Money/hour is most important factor in making money.I dont see how u can think doing 1 story run in 24hours or 4 story runs in 24hours is the same end result.

Even if you sold all items at half price just the fact u did x4 more in the same time is alredy very different.

Edited November 8 by MightyBoxer

[Arahbo]

On 11/7/2019 at 3:06 PM, BoltBlades12 said:

I think he was referring to the main games and not the spinoffs. Because man Darkrai in PMD EOS was a pain in the ass.

Indeed. Still probably one of the best spin off game in my opinion

[BoltBlades12]

22 minutes ago, Arahbo said:

Indeed. Still probably one of the best spin off game in my opinion

agreed. The Mystery Dungeon franchise are some of the best Pokemon spinoffs