Process Update Adding the Prevo vote during Movepools

[DHR-107]

Hey all!

After speaking with Birkal and reading around the lines during movepools, and seeing how we have now split the movepools up into being a competitive section and a flavour section, I think we should be considering the below for an official change to our Process.

Part 9 - Moveset Discussion
Part 9 - Moves Poll
Part 9 - Prevolution Poll
Part 9 - Full Movepool Submissions
Part 9 - Movepool Poll 1 etc

I think this change will massively aid our Movepool creators in having prevolution moves/or considering different aspects and moves to their movepool designs with some idea about what we will be creating in the future in regards to prevolutions. The prevo process would still start properly after the end of the competitive stages of a CaP (Much like I have started this one now). At most it would be a 24 hour "cool off" period after the competitively viable moves have been decided where you can already start formulating a movepool before knowing how many prevos there will be.

Questions:
How do the movepool creators feel about this change?
Would this aid in your movepool Design?
Does anyone feel this would slow the process up unjustly?

EDIT: If you are not on PRC (I'll poke Birkal to look at applications) you can PM me or another mod to post on your behalf.

 

[DHR-107]

How do the movepool creators feel about this change? Would this aid in your movepool Design?

This would be a really big improvement on the current system, since the uncertainty as to if we're getting a prevo or not leads to their being many blank bits in movepool design. For instance, if a mon is an evolution of another mon, then in 9/10 cases (standard level up) you'd expect to see a shift in the pattern of the speed moves get learnt at - this is a sort of in-game trade off where you hold off on evolving to get stronger moves earlier.

Knowing our options on the prevo also allows us to design including Prevo Moves, Evo Moves, and with effective Heart Scale options. Heck, it gives us free reign to do some really fun options, such as devoloping a Stone-Evolution movepool, as you can see on Florges.

So yeah, I 100% approve, and would very much appreciate it.

Does anyone feel this would slow the process up unjustly?

It's a poll that can even be done during the Moveset discussion due to there being no need for a discussion step, so I'm going to say that if anything the process becomes a smidgen faster.

Dogfish44 is one of our longstanding movepool submitter's and isn't in PRC so I am posting a response he PM'd me.

 

[Quanyails]

For some historical context: in the past, pre-evos weren't a "thing" during the CAP process, and even after, they were done as a flavor project after the main CAP was completed. CAP movepools submissions have used pre-evos in flavor reasoning (i.e., Fidgit's Tailwind), but the rules at the stage weren't updated when pre-evos became formalized.

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I think it makes sense to run the pre-evo poll some time before movepool. I can think of pros and cons as to exactly when, however.

There's no problem if we run the pre-evo poll alongside the other post-art threads. It would be the way that best keeps the CAP process moving, instead of there being a "gap" of competitive discussion.

However, we have a lot of threads right after art polls already: movesets, name, and sprites. That's a lot of activity in one burst, and it might make for a better-paced process if we made some of these events sequentially. For instance, if we ran the pre-evo poll between movesets and movepool, it could help movepool designers to get a day to build the movepool. An extra day would be very helpful for the 3D modeling team, too! That's a topic worthy of its own thread.

As I have not designed movepools, I can't answer questions 1 and 2. For 3, I think it comes down to whether we want to give preference to CAP's competitive side or CAP's flavor side.

 

[snake]

How do the movepool creators feel about this change?

I'm not trying to be salty that I didn't win CAP24's movepool vote, but I remember some people on discord saying that they didn't like the evolution move in my movepool because it implied an evolution in my movepool. And it really did; I really wanted CAP24 to have at least one prevo (2 would have been cool). But anyway, when people said that they didn't want evolution moves in the movepool, it was frustrating because I was just trying to use that aspect of flavor for a movepool. I don't want to throw around names or start up any drama; I just think that this solution would eliminate any disagreement on evolution moves on the prevo.

Would this aid in your movepool Design?

Actually, this would greatly improve the design of movepools. One thing about CAP movepools is that they usually have a set movepool pattern, which for a final evolution for a Game Freak Pokemon doesn't happen. The level gap usually increases with every evolution, and with no knowledge of prevos, it's harder for this to happen. In my CAP24 submission, for example, my level gap increased so that there were 3 sections of different patterns to accommodate for 2 prevos. It would be much easier to work with if we simply knew of how many prevos we were going to get.

Does anyone feel this would slow the process up unjustly?

Not really. We spent quite a few days on movepool, especially with everyone throwing legality checks everywhere. If we could get the legality checks out of the way (or actually address this issue) before movepool submissions, the thread would be much easier to read.

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The only downside I can see with this change is someone trying to push down flavor onto the prevos from the get-go in the movepool. For example, if someone wanted to put Ghost-type flavor in the early stages of CAP24's movepool, then it'd be likely that the prevo would have a Ghost-type. I'm not really sure how to regulate that, but since it's down to a vote, if people don't like that sort of flavor, they just won't vote for it.

 

[jas61292]

Actually, this would greatly improve the design of movepools. One thing about CAP movepools is that they usually have a set movepool pattern, which for a final evolution for a Game Freak Pokemon doesn't happen. The level gap usually increases with every evolution, and with no knowledge of prevos, it's harder for this to happen. In my CAP24 submission, for example, my level gap increased so that there were 3 sections of different patterns to accommodate for 2 prevos. It would be much easier to work with if we simply knew of how many prevos we were going to get.

The one thing about this is that if it is to be useful we need to not only know how many prevos there are, but also allow move-pool submitters for the main CAP to be the ones who decide on evolution method. After all, making a level patter start shifting at level 38 is not going to be a flavor improvement if it evolves at level 20. As this is all flavor, that's not a huge deal, but it would mean deciding on the evolution method either explicitly or implicitly before we know the prevos' stats, abilities, or design.

I don't particularly care myself, but I thought it would be something important to note.

 

[DHR-107]

The one thing about this is that if it is to be useful we need to not only know how many prevos there are, but also allow move-pool submitters for the main CAP to be the ones who decide on evolution method. After all, making a level patter start shifting at level 38 is not going to be a flavor improvement if it evolves at level 20. As this is all flavor, that's not a huge deal, but it would mean deciding on the evolution method either explicitly or implicitly before we know the prevos' stats, abilities, or design.

I don't particularly care myself, but I thought it would be something important to note.

This is actually something I thought about last night. I would have to shift evolution method over to the Movepool creators to give them maximum creativity. It would be much harder to come at it from the other direction and decide those things if we continue to do it the way we do now. Ultimately, I am fine with that compromise. Prevos are secondary at the end of the day, so in that instance would NOT including and evolution method prevent the Sub from being legal?

 

[DHR-107]

Let's get this sorted before CaP 25 gets anywhere near movepools.

I think it would be best to fit it in somewhere around the movepool discussions but definitely before Full Movepool Submissions. Does anyone have any specific ideas of where it should be placed in the grand scheme of things?

Can I get some other mods to sign this off and let's get it added to the CaP Proper process!

 

[Quanyails]

The current CAP process has the following order:

1. Moveset Discussion/Art Poll(s)
2. Moveset Submissions/Name Submissions/Sprite Submissions
3. Moves Poll(s)
4. Name Poll(s)
5. Movepool Submissions
6. Movepool Poll(s)

The pre-evo poll must be held after art finishes and before movepool starts, meaning that we must hold it between steps 1 and 5. We could carve out an additional 24 hours for the pre-evo poll or hold it alongside the other threads. I think our best bet is to hold it when name move polls occur. This way we don't stretch the process out for another 24 hours (sorry, modelers!), we don't have four simultaneous happenings in CAP after art finishes, and it gives movepool designers full information about what their movepools should contain.

This can count as my sign-off 'u'b

Edit: Missed a step!

 

[Birkal]

Discord Log

[8:26 AM] Quanyails: What do you think about it being with name polls?
[8:26 AM] Quanyails: I've been going back and forth over that.
[8:27 AM] Birkal: How about after art poll
[8:27 AM] Birkal: We do prevo, moveset, and sprites
[8:27 AM] Quanyails: And names?
[8:27 AM] Birkal: After prevo poll do names
[8:28 AM] Quanyails: Hmm...
[8:28 AM] Quanyails: That could work.
[8:28 AM] Quanyails: Yeah, that works for me.
[8:31 AM] Birkal: Name polls always are fastest anyways
[8:31 AM] Quanyails: They still take at least three rounds. :T
[8:33 AM] Birkal: I mean we finish flavor stuff before competitive stuff
[8:33 AM] Birkal: After art polls
[8:33 AM] Birkal: Also names are affected by amount of prevos
[8:33 AM] Quanyails: I've never seen that. o3o
[8:34 AM] Quanyails: Actually, this might be reason to not do names after pre-evos.
[8:34 AM] DHR: I'd rather avoid it
[8:34 AM] DHR: If we can
[8:34 AM] DHR: Because otherwise name subs will be "we have 2 prevos, lets make a 1/2/3 name" or something
[8:34 AM] DHR: But the ordering doesn't work for that
[8:35 AM] Quanyails: I'd rather the name of the pre-evo follow the art, rather than the art comply with the name.
[8:36 AM] DHR: what
[8:36 AM] DHR: Are you implying the prevo process gets moved into cap proper or are we getting confused
[8:36 AM] Quanyails: Nah.
[8:37 AM] Quanyails: I'm talking about people planning out 1/2/3 names if we move pre-evos before names.
[8:37 AM] Quanyails: That forces our hand when we get to pre-evos.
[8:37 AM] Quanyails: You could argue the same for movepools, I guess.
[8:39 AM] DHR: I mean ultimately we will know how many prevos we will have
[8:39 AM] DHR: but yeah, the chances of getting a "three" set of names is super super small lol
[8:40 AM] Birkal: I agree
[8:40 AM] Birkal: Cycholm has two evos and doesn’t have a trio name
[8:41 AM] Birkal: That argument could be made with the current process — giving it a “trio” name slots it into two prevos
[8:42 AM] DHR: Yeah, but with the prevo poll being before people could potentially make more informed posts regarding names and movepools
[8:42 AM] DHR: Like, there isn't a huge downside at all
[8:46 AM] Quanyails: I'm fine with it, if the three of us want to endorse that.
[9:04 AM] Birkal: Yep
[9:04 AM] Birkal: I’m in

tl;dr - Let's do Pre-Evolution Poll simultaneously with Sprite Submissions and Moveset Discussion. This will bump Name Submissions back a few days, but the logic here is that Name Submissions (and the flavor aspects) usually end first anyways. We might as well help out movepool makers by delaying Name Submissions slightly. It will also help people submit more informed names.

If you have something to discuss or object to here, please let it be known. Otherwise, Quanyails , DHR-107 , and I will move forward with this change. Thank you all for the discussion!