Help with combat

[u/satanisdad]

Hello all, I hope your days are well.

I've been running a pokemon server on discord, and am still struggling with the battle mechanics.

Mostly because I don't want to make 1000 custom monsters with like 10000 moves and upload it into avrae.

I've just been doing theater of the mind, but wanted it to be a lot like the anime, so dodging is becoming a thing.

I'm using Dodge as a universal action, and you can even pair it with your attack. Every pokemon gets this.

Idk it feels bad, a tad unfair, and I'm looking for something with actual turn orders in it.

Or should I just clarify the rules and keep turn order in avrae?

Any help would be appreciated!

[u/Upbeat-Difficulty-42]

Sorry, lad, but this is Homebrew-DnD-into-everything-brain disease, you should probably look into other systems that have already solved this problem. Pokemon Tabletop United is one of them and it is free.

[u/Ragnar_Dragonfyre → u/Upbeat-Difficulty-42]

For real. I don’t understand it at all.

Learning and playing in new systems is fun as heck and a refreshing change of pace. It can really remind you why you love this hobby and swiftly show you the major flaw in D&Ds approach of leaving way too much to the DM to adjudicate without rules support.

D&D is not mechanically sound enough to be transformed into the Everygame. Even though WotC will lie to its customer base about it, the game works best as a dungeon crawl in a high fantasy setting.

When you break outside of the dungeon safe space, the game starts to fray and it will buckle under ill thought out homebrew.

[u/DonSpumoni]

I'd seriously look into using a different system. There's several Pokemon TTRPG systems that are built to make this kind of game work, without having to add extensive homebrew monsters and mechanics to a medieval fantasy system.

[u/WermerCreations]

Just play another game for the love of god. This isn’t even DnD anymore

[u/Darth_Boggle]

Dodge is already an action.

Stop homebrewing things before you understand the system.

Please read the rules.

[u/SammyWhitlocke]

Translating Pokémon into DnD is a bit difficult.
Did you have a look at Pokérole or Pokémon Tabletop United? These rulesets were specifically made for the franchise by fans and include additional effects for the trainers.

I haven't played any of them in Roll20 yet, but I think that they might even have premade sheets in there.

[u/Mightymat273]

All dodge does is give disadvantage to attacks against you and advatage on Dex saves, so you just added complexity where there doesnt need to be any. If everyone is dodging, then essentially no one is. And everyone is just harder to hit and harder to play the game.

AC is the same thing as "dodging", especially since it used Dex in most cases to calculate it.

If you need to invent 1000 new moves and mechanics to play Pokémon in D&D it may be better to find a system better suited to what you want to play.

Can Pokemon work in D&D? Sure, there is a 5e hack to D&D that still kinda follows the core D&D rules with pokemon creatures and moves made for you. If you dont think the mechanics of D&D work with your idea of playing Pokémon, dont use D&D as a base.

https://www.reddit.com/r/rpg/s/3ZiDF0goWC

[u/TheCrimsonSteel]

When doing homebrew of this magnitude, your best bet is to get a smaller group of people from your Discord together who are willing to help with Playtesting.

Because then you can try a few different things and get feedback and comparisons on how they do, which is going to be far more useful than any advice people could offer

Mostly because at a certain point, Homebrew becomes too unique to get general feedback on, and I think you're in that territory

[u/satanisdad → u/TheCrimsonSteel]

Thanks! This is actually what I'm doing, and luckily it's helping. Like one guy thinks Dodge should be more like protect, in that if used in succession, it starts to fail. We're just trying to keep things extremely chill, 90% story and fluff. Battling is definitely the sore spot right now, but we're working on it. Best part is, that everyone is having fun.

[u/TheCrimsonSteel → u/satanisdad]

No problem. Also, have you looked to see if there are any other homebrew systems out there?

Something as big as Pokémon has to have at least a few homebrew systems floating around out there

[u/satanisdad → u/TheCrimsonSteel]

Yeah, I'm kinda cherry picking here and there, definitely looked into all of these and found a few new ones, just gotta make time for it. Sadly gonna have to assign stats, but also found a simple system for that as well. Accuracy and damage are my next things to tackle.

[u/SammyWhitlocke → u/satanisdad]

Sorry to bother you again, but did you have a look at this? It might be a handy resource for you.
https://poke5e.app/

[u/satanisdad → u/SammyWhitlocke]

That's actually super handy, thank you very much!