Official Pokémon Sword and Shield speculation thread (Updated June 5th, 2019)

[Plubio]

Honestly, I'm a little bummed that we aren't going back to the BW strategy of an entire new Pokedex, but I guess that wasn't popular enough for them to do again? I dunno, I wasn't bothered by the absence of older Pokemon during the main campaign, especially since I've always been a fan of importing up my old Pokemon anyway, so catching the same species again in a new generation seems largely pointless, outside of beating the regional dex before Bank is made available.

The main issue here is game balance, especially towards new Pokémon variety — 150 new Pokémon "worked" (personal opinions aside) on a game like Black and White because the main campaign itself was rather "small" compared to, for example, Kalos or Alola (Galar is totally out the question I guess). And even then, the amount of times you have to fight the very same Pokémon in the whole game is boring. Nearly every single Route has a trainer with one of the elemental monkeys or a Pidove evolution.
Even Unova's Elite Four suffered from this: only 4 Pokémon the first time. During the rematch they all got 6, with 2 being older Pokémon.

Is the same issue I've got against Kanto — not bad, but the variety is pretty poor and you face different trainers with nearly the same Pokémon more than enough times. Let's go! balanced it a bit better, but still.

 

[PocketMonster]

Spoiler: Armored Zeraora

https://i.********/vp/1553527339806.jpg

I admit, that looks awesome

What is the concept of the supposed Armored Evolution anyway? I thought it was suppose to have some sort of armor. And supposedly the rival of Mega Evolution right?
Mega evolution is essentially changing ability typing? Is there anything else?
If armor evolution is a thing, perhaps it will effect the attack sp attack defense and sp defense of the pokemon. (im not sure if mega does this anyway)
Well the pic here looks like mega evolution to me.

 

[TheElderKing]

Should the case ever be that Armored forms are a thing. It'd most definitely be on a hnadful of pokemon like megas. Don't think GF got it in them to put armor designs on all mons.

Of course they won’t, I’d be replally surprised if they’d.
Which makes the gimmick not really important to me, expecially since the leaks on it mention that it’d given to some Pokémon that already have Mega Evolutions. If it’d be something they used to extend the pool of Pokémon with Special evolutions, it’d be better, but giving it to Pokémon with Megas is dumb.

Regardless, I don’t think AE is the gimmick referenced in the Japanese logos.

 

[TheElderKing]

What is the concept of the supposed Armored Evolution anyway? I thought it was suppose to have some sort of armor. And supposedly the rival of Mega Evolution right?
Mega evolution is essentially changing ability typing? Is there anything else?
If armor evolution is a thing, perhaps it will effect the attack sp attack defense and sp defense of the pokemon. (im not sure if mega does this anyway)
Well the pic here looks like mega evolution to me.

Depending on the Pokémon, some of the stats are changed when Megaevolving, so it won’t be something new.

 

[Knightwolf09]

What is the concept of the supposed Armored Evolution anyway? I thought it was suppose to have some sort of armor. And supposedly the rival of Mega Evolution right?
Mega evolution is essentially changing ability typing? Is there anything else?
If armor evolution is a thing, perhaps it will effect the attack sp attack defense and sp defense of the pokemon. (im not sure if mega does this anyway)
Well the pic here looks like mega evolution to me.

Mega's aren't just changing types and abilities, the pokemon literally evolves one more time, and like regular evolution the pokemon changes, from it's look to it's stats. Armor is literally just plating, not too different from Necorzma's other forms. So yeah, stat boosts might be the only thing to it.

 

[Zweilous]

Don't forget the Nimbasa Stadiums, they served as daily battles to allow the player to grind.

Yep, those too, though them being in the 60s meant they were more limited for grinding past a certain point.

The main issue here is game balance, especially towards new Pokémon variety — 150 new Pokémon "worked" (personal opinions aside) on a game like Black and White because the main campaign itself was rather "small" compared to, for example, Kalos or Alola (Galar is totally out the question I guess). And even then, the amount of times you have to fight the very same Pokémon in the whole game is boring. Nearly every single Route has a trainer with one of the elemental monkeys or a Pidove evolution.
Even Unova's Elite Four suffered from this: only 4 Pokémon the first time. During the rematch they all got 6, with 2 being older Pokémon.

Is the same issue I've got against Kanto — not bad, but the variety is pretty poor and you face different trainers with nearly the same Pokémon more than enough times. Let's go! balanced it a bit better, but still.

Redundant Pokemon I'd honestly say is more a franchise issue then an individual game one. In RSE for instance both teams only drew from three lines of Pokemon, so you were always fighting Mightyenas and Numels/Carvanhas, and the Elite Four 'made up' for having one more Pokemon by also dipping into the same redundancy as the Kanto ones as you had Glacia with two Glalies and Drake with a Shelgon and Salamence.

 

[Plubio]

Redundant Pokemon I'd honestly say is more a franchise issue then an individual game one. In RSE for instance both teams only drew from three lines of Pokemon, so you were always fighting Mightyenas and Numels/Carvanhas, and the Elite Four 'made up' for having one more Pokemon by also dipping into the same redundancy as the Kanto ones as you had Glacia with two Glalies and Drake with a Shelgon and Salamence.

Hoenn's distribution (when it comes to stuff like you pointed out) is also awful, anyway. Was happy to see Elite Four or important characters using a mix of old and new Pokémon on later gens — that feels more natural.
Imo B2W2, XY and USUM have a very good choice of avaliable Pokémon. Hoping for Galar to be the same.

 

[Synthaphone]

The main issue here is game balance, especially towards new Pokémon variety — 150 new Pokémon "worked" (personal opinions aside) on a game like Black and White because the main campaign itself was rather "small" compared to, for example, Kalos or Alola (Galar is totally out the question I guess). And even then, the amount of times you have to fight the very same Pokémon in the whole game is boring. Nearly every single Route has a trainer with one of the elemental monkeys or a Pidove evolution.
Even Unova's Elite Four suffered from this: only 4 Pokémon the first time. During the rematch they all got 6, with 2 being older Pokémon.

Is the same issue I've got against Kanto — not bad, but the variety is pretty poor and you face different trainers with nearly the same Pokémon more than enough times. Let's go! balanced it a bit better, but still.

Ahh, that makes some amount of sense, although I've never really thought of Black and White's campaign as 'small' before? It seems like its a fairly decent length to me, but I might be a poor judge of that kind of thing.
I'm also replaying Black now, and I think that the repeat Pokemon fighting you're talking about is present, but not quite as exaggerated as you suggest- I don't feel like I've seen the elemental monkeys or the Pidove family quite that often. I do fight a lot of Herdiers though, that's getting kind of tedious (I guess it makes sense that a lot of people would have what's basically a domestic dog, but the fact that it looks so much like a normal dog kind of makes me feel worse for knocking them out so frequently.)

There are definitely some routes where I would like to have more Pokemon to choose from though (Its frustrating to be past the 5th gym and to still not have found a fire type I like, since the only options so far are the Pansear, Darumaka, and Tepig families, and I didn't choose Tepig for this playthrough.) I can definitely see how adding in older Pokemon again could help with that, without making the number of new Pokemon climb ridiculously high.

I guess I'll just hope that they're going to carry forward more interesting Pokemon that we don't see every generation- It certainly looks possible right now, I think the only Pokemon I'm really tired of raising that seem to be here are Pikachu (a given, its almost always available), Lucario, and Flygon. (and I do like Lucario, Raichu, and Flygon! I just have so many of them from previous games already, I don't really want to train any new ones.)

 

[AngryBinacle]

Well, Alola had a gigantic dex, but the average Team Skull grunt still used the same 'mons; sadly enough. Anyway, I get the point. B/W certainly had its limits with 150 'mons, but I think the way BW2 handled it was perfect: the new 150 mons and a lot of older ones to spice it up. Alola and Kalos had big regional dexes too, but that shouldn't mean that new designs should be limited to around 80 in my honest opinion.

The ideal world would have +-120 new 'mons as well as a big regional dex using 'mons from the 7 other generations.

 

[PocketMonster]

Spoiler: Pachylemur

Grookey's Last Evolution Possibly be based on this animal?

 

[Knightwolf09]

Spoiler: Pachylemur

Grookey's Last Evolution Possibly be based on this animal?

Why that animal specifically?

 

[AngryBinacle]

Spoiler: Pachylemur

Grookey's Last Evolution Possibly be based on this animal?

Why would they go from monkey to a lemur?

 

[swiftgallade46]

I really wish GameFreak would just stick to the cool mechanics we have already instead of feeling obligated to introduce a new one each gen. I feel like a lot of people would be content for them to just expand upon Megas and new evolutions of old pokemon. Heck, even Z-moves. I just don’t want yet another thing to keep track of.

Especially not armor evolution. I just can’t really picture a way for it to not be either the same thing as mega evolution but w a different name or a strictly worse form of mega evolution. Either way it seems pointless, but I guess we’ll see.

 

[PocketMonster]

Why that animal specifically?

Why would they go from monkey to a lemur?

Prosimians are considered the most primitive group of primates.

• Examples of prosimians include the indri, lemurs, tarsiers, sifakas, and lorises.
• Prosimians have relatively smaller brains and rely more on the sense of smell.
• Prosimians have structural differences in their skull and reproductive biology.
• All lemurs and lemur-like prosimians are endemic to Madagascar. Some nocturnal prosimians inhabit parts of Africa and Asia.

Primate Info Net: Common Marmoset: General Information

And grookey being called marmoset in part of his names in some of his names. such as the French.
ouistiti

Edit

Callitrichids belong to a class of monkeys called New World monkeys, or Platyrrhines.

• New World monkeys are found exclusively in Central and South America.
• Fossil evidence indicates that monkeys first appeared in the New World approximately 30 million years ago during a time period called the Oligocene.
• In addition to marmosets and tamarins, New World monkeys include species such as the squirrel monkey, the spider monkey, the capuchin, the uakari, the owl monkey, and the muriqui monkey.

Common name: Common marmoset
Family: Callitrichidae
Genus: Callithrix
Species:jacchus

Callitrichids share much in common with other New World monkeys. However, they also display several traits that set them apart as a group:

• small body size
• Fewer teeth (32 vs. 36) because of their small body size and specialized lower dentition because of their diet
• Claws replace nails on all digits but the big toe
• Non-identical twins are born rather than one infant
• Lack of a prehensile tail

While Callitrichids share the above traits, they are also a very diverse group of primates, especially in appearance.

• Some examples of Callitrichids include the moustached tamarin, the golden-handed tamarin, the emperor tamarin, the bare-faced tamarin, the cotton-top tamarin, the golden lion tamarin, the black tufted-eared marmoset, the common marmoset, the buffy-headed marmoset, and Geoffroyi's tufted-eared marmoset.

Pachylemur is an extinct, giant lemur most closely related to the ruffed lemurs of genus Varecia. Two species are known, Pachylemur insignis and Pachylemur jullyi, although there is some doubt as to whether or not they may actually be the same species. Pachylemur is sometimes referred to as the giant ruffed lemur, because although it and the living ruffed lemurs had similar teeth and skeletons, Pachylemur was more robust and as much as three to four times larger. DNA studies have confirmed a sister group relationship between these two types of lemur. Like living ruffed lemurs, Pachylemur specialized in eating fruit, and was therefore an important seed disperser, possibly for tree species with seeds too large for even ruffed lemurs to swallow. In the spiny thickets of southwestern Madagascar, they were also likely to have dispersed seeds evolved to attach to fur and be carried away. Unlike ruffed lemurs, the fore- and hindlimbs of Pachylemur were nearly the same length, and therefore it was likely to be a slow, deliberate climber. However, both used hindlimb suspension to reach fruit on small branches below them.
For many years, palaeoanthropologists thought that Pachylemur was a ground-dwelling lemur due to its robust postcranial skeleton.[2] Yet more recent analysis of its axial and appendicular skeleton—particularly the vertebrae and femur—suggests that it was a tree-dweller (arboreal).[2][29] Like the ruffed lemurs, Pachylemur was also an arboreal quadruped that frequently exhibited hindlimb suspension in order to reach fruit and leaves on smaller branches.

 

[AngryBinacle]

I really wish GameFreak would just stick to the cool mechanics we have already instead of feeling obligated to introduce a new one each gen. I feel like a lot of people would be content for them to just expand upon Megas and new evolutions of old pokemon. Heck, even Z-moves. I just don’t want yet another thing to keep track of.

Especially not armor evolution. I just can’t really picture a way for it to not be either the same thing as mega evolution but w a different name or a strictly worse form of mega evolution. Either way it seems pointless, but I guess we’ll see.

I think that might be one of the reasons why the symbol in the Japanese logo has nothing to do with such a mechanic; it's probably not there.

 

[PocketMonster]

It seems Pachylemur shares alot with Marmosets though from a different part of the world. And it is extinct.
Tree dwellers for the most part. They hang by limbs rather than tails. And it has a history of placement trouble.

 

[PocketMonster]

Prosimians are considered the most primitive group of primates.

• Examples of prosimians include the indri, lemurs, tarsiers, sifakas, and lorises.
• Prosimians have relatively smaller brains and rely more on the sense of smell.
• Prosimians have structural differences in their skull and reproductive biology.
• All lemurs and lemur-like prosimians are endemic to Madagascar. Some nocturnal prosimians inhabit parts of Africa and Asia.

Primate Info Net: Common Marmoset: General Information

And grookey being called marmoset in part of his names in some of his names. such as the French.
ouistiti

Edit

Callitrichids belong to a class of monkeys called New World monkeys, or Platyrrhines.

• New World monkeys are found exclusively in Central and South America.
• Fossil evidence indicates that monkeys first appeared in the New World approximately 30 million years ago during a time period called the Oligocene.
• In addition to marmosets and tamarins, New World monkeys include species such as the squirrel monkey, the spider monkey, the capuchin, the uakari, the owl monkey, and the muriqui monkey.

Common name: Common marmoset
Family: Callitrichidae
Genus: Callithrix
Species:jacchus

Callitrichids share much in common with other New World monkeys. However, they also display several traits that set them apart as a group:

• small body size
• Fewer teeth (32 vs. 36) because of their small body size and specialized lower dentition because of their diet
• Claws replace nails on all digits but the big toe
• Non-identical twins are born rather than one infant
• Lack of a prehensile tail

While Callitrichids share the above traits, they are also a very diverse group of primates, especially in appearance.

• Some examples of Callitrichids include the moustached tamarin, the golden-handed tamarin, the emperor tamarin, the bare-faced tamarin, the cotton-top tamarin, the golden lion tamarin, the black tufted-eared marmoset, the common marmoset, the buffy-headed marmoset, and Geoffroyi's tufted-eared marmoset.

Pachylemur is an extinct, giant lemur most closely related to the ruffed lemurs of genus Varecia. Two species are known, Pachylemur insignis and Pachylemur jullyi, although there is some doubt as to whether or not they may actually be the same species. Pachylemur is sometimes referred to as the giant ruffed lemur, because although it and the living ruffed lemurs had similar teeth and skeletons, Pachylemur was more robust and as much as three to four times larger. DNA studies have confirmed a sister group relationship between these two types of lemur. Like living ruffed lemurs, Pachylemur specialized in eating fruit, and was therefore an important seed disperser, possibly for tree species with seeds too large for even ruffed lemurs to swallow. In the spiny thickets of southwestern Madagascar, they were also likely to have dispersed seeds evolved to attach to fur and be carried away. Unlike ruffed lemurs, the fore- and hindlimbs of Pachylemur were nearly the same length, and therefore it was likely to be a slow, deliberate climber. However, both used hindlimb suspension to reach fruit on small branches below them.
For many years, palaeoanthropologists thought that Pachylemur was a ground-dwelling lemur due to its robust postcranial skeleton.[2] Yet more recent analysis of its axial and appendicular skeleton—particularly the vertebrae and femur—suggests that it was a tree-dweller (arboreal).[2][29] Like the ruffed lemurs, Pachylemur was also an arboreal quadruped that frequently exhibited hindlimb suspension in order to reach fruit and leaves on smaller branches.

• In 1948, paleontologist Charles Lamberton proposed a new sub-genus for the giant ruffed lemurs, Pachylemur, which had previously been placed in the genus Lemur. Since the 1960s, it has been considered its own separate genus, although the two extinct species of giant ruffed lemur have sometimes been grouped under Varecia with their closest relatives.[89]

Taxonomy of lemurs | Wikiwand

Among ruffed lemurs (genus Varecia) and the South American marmosets (genus Callithrix) twin births are the rule, but triplets are also relatively common.
Varecia

 

[Grass Type Gardenia]

I'm sure the Alola Forms, Rainbow Rocket, vacation theme and change of gameplay, and the many things connected to Kanto in Alola in Gen 7 are all to celibate 20 years of Pokemon.

Gen 8 could be getting more Mega Evolutions. Here below are some examples of likely ones...

Mega Meganium, Mega Typhlosion, Mega Feraligator, Mega Flygon, Mega Torterra, Mega Infernape, Mega Empoleon, Mega Drapion, Mega Toxicroak, Mega Electivire, Mega Magmortar, Mega Gliscor, Mega Froslass and such likely examples.

 

[RileyXY1]

I'm sure the Alola Forms, Rainbow Rocket, vacation theme and change of gameplay, and the many things connected to Kanto in Alola in Gen 7 are all to celibate 20 years of Pokemon.

Gen 8 could be getting more Mega Evolutions. Here below are some examples of likely ones...

Mega Meganium, Mega Typhlosion, Mega Feraligator, Mega Flygon, Mega Torterra, Mega Infernape, Mega Empoleon, Mega Drapion, Mega Toxicroak, Mega Electivire, Mega Magmortar, Mega Gliscor, Mega Froslass and such likely examples.

I don't think that there will be any more new megas.

 

[Knightwolf09]

It seems Pachylemur shares alot with Marmosets though from a different part of the world. And it is extinct.
Tree dwellers for the most part. They hang by limbs rather than tails. And it has a history of placement trouble.

Well that is an interesting point you brought up. And it also matches the criteria of extinct creature for grass starters