Removing all randomness from battles - would it work?

[Puddle]

Some people claim that Pokemon isn't a truly competitive game, because there is an element of chance to the battles. A Pokemon dodging a Focus Blast, being frozen by an Ice Beam, or getting a stat boost from Ancient Power can completely turn the tides.

But what would happen if all randomness was removed from battles - if all moves had 100% accuracy, and all secondary effects were guaranteed to occur? Would it work? I think it could, as long as some moves had their secondary effects changed or removed to keep the game balanced. Moves that previously affected accuracy, like Sand Attack and Double Team, could be repurposed or removed entirely, and Protect could be guaranteed to fail if used twice consecutively.

I wonder if anyone has ever tried to organise a tournament where only moves and abilities that are completely free from randomness are permitted, and the only status effects allowed are burn and poison?

 

[RileyXY1]

Temtem works like this. There are no random elements in battles whatsoever.

 

[WyndonCalling]

As a nigh-obsessive Random battler (and, dare I say it, a half-decent one), there's two broad categories of RNG I'd identify and the distinction entirely depends on the percentage chance of certain effects.

The first of these are the forms of RNG that you can plan and account for, both in teambuilding and in battle. Any move with 80% or lower accuracy is unreliable, and you'll know this when constructing your team; you'll know that Alakazam can do with some Fighting-type support to reduce its reliance on Focus Blast, and you'll know that switching Alakazam out against a Fighting-weak type is perhaps the wiser choice if you absolutely can't risk the miss.

Moves with secondary effects of 30% likelihood or higher also involve similar thought processes - it's legitimate to spam Scald in anticipation of a burn as a solution to physical attackers, and your opponents know this too. I know it's a serious risk to switch Rillaboom in on Toxapex, so I can account for this by thinking of secondary means to handle 'Pex or refrain from switching Rillaboom in at all. The odds are relevant enough for them to factor into my assessment of risk, and that kind of decision-making only enhances the experience from my perspective.

10% odds or lower, whether that's for misses or secondary effects, can get in the sea. It's usually pointless to try and factor these into the gameplan. It's simply not worth it to really worry about the chances of Ice Beam freezing my Steel-type switch-in, nor is it credible for me to use Ice Beam in serious anticipation of scoring a freeze - I'm using the move for the base power, not the secondary effect, so when the freeze does happen it's an unaccountable game-changer, an act of Arceus. The exact same applies to 90% accurate moves, I never feel like I've lost due to an oversight in my risk assessment when Draco Meteor misses.

Critical hits are in a reasonable place right now. They were just as egregious as random freeze or paralysis back in the day, but their new formulation helps serve their purpose (keeping defensive set-up strategies in check) while resulting in fewer dramatic swings.

 

[Daenerys]

Randomness can be very annoying but I think I'd rather keep that factor in battles. Even though it doesn't always work in your favor I think it's better to rely on a little luck sometimes than have everything be determined beforehand.

 

[nickdt]

Temtem works like this. There are no random elements in battles whatsoever.

True. Which makes the battles extremely boring. Just switch in a Temtem that resists the opposing mon.

 

[TechSkylander1518]

You know, I was thinking at first that it wouldn't really work, but when I tried to analyze why, I realized that there's still a lot of different move effects out there. With five stats left to manipulate and plenty of move effects out there to interact with (like how Brick Break breaks Light Screen and Barrier), not to mention unique conditions to manipulate the base power of a move, and priority, there's still lots of ways that moves could be kept varied, so I think a Pokemon game like that could still work. There'd definitely need to be a major overhaul of things to make it happen, though, and unless trainer's teams were specifically designed with this in mind, games might become a lot easier.

 

[LukeLucario6]

I can see both sides of the argument both in favor and against random side effects in battles but I think it would be better to just keep stuff like that intact. Pokemon battles are fun and unpredictable exactly because there are random factors.

 

[Phosphene]

Which makes the battles extremely boring. Just switch in a Temtem that resists the opposing mon.

Respectfully, I disagree. In my opinion, randomness in Pokémon battles is generally rare enough that it has little impact on the outcome of in-game battles at least. I don't really notice the lack of RNG in Temtem because it doesn't really effect my normal in-game playthroughs in Pokémon, thus I don't find Temtem battles "extremely boring" because they play out almost exactly the same as in Pokémon. Most of my Pokémon battles are exactly like your last sentence, i.e., switching in a Pokémon that has the type advantage against my opponent. In fact, I don't think I've ever relied on luck over type advantages in in-game playthroughs. With regards to competitive battles, while randomness has altered the course of some the battles I've been in, I don't think removing RNG entirely would end up making them boring because I think competitive battles are still more complex than just type advantages.

That's not to say that I'm in favor of or against completely removing randomness (though I do like the idea of making battles more skill-based), just that I don't think it would make battles boring.

 

[Norzan]

Plenty of turn based RPGs with no RNG that are a lot of fun.

Obviously it could work in Pokemon as well, but the RNG is so ingrained into the games that its removal would need a ton of balancing since moves are balanced around RNG.

 

[colours]

removal of random chance in battles is essentially rendering moves with a 30% chance of causing status more or less useless, assuming that, because of this change, they aren't a thing anymore because otherwise they'd just be guaranteed status which would be.... quite overpowered. while they may still exist as a result of randomness being removed, their whole purpose is to be spammed to cause status, so i can imagine their practicality would go out the door.

the moves that have a 10% secondary chance of inflicting status effects would remain largely unchanged, because 10% is, as Wyndon put it, largely something you don't plan for and if it happens, it's more or less a game changer than something intentional. these moves are used for power and accuracy than anything else.

so this sums up three things that are to be affected, assuming randomness in pokemon is removed:

• critical hits - one shouldn't plan too much for a crit, so i don't imagine the removal of this affecting too much
• OHKO moves - i can imagine these would flat out be removed as their whole point is extremely low success but high value if it lands
• 30% status moves - as stated, these would be altered significantly to either remove their 30% secondary effect, or removed entirely.

to be honest, i kiiiinda like randomness existing as a concept, because RNG rearing its (un)favourable head constantly keeps players on their toes and keeps them planning around it, assuming there is a way around, anyway. a vast majority of battles may play out similarly (as SpinyShell pointed out), but in the event that RNG occurs in any given pokemon battle, it makes things... rather interesting, for better or worse.

 

[Isaac the Investigator]

Chess is a game with no randomness, but is not boring at all, though tastes may differ. I'd definitely prefer for things like 10% chances to be removed but I feel 30% is a fair chance for you to have to consider something happening (I'd still support a Scald ban for other reasons but I digress). Still, if you wanted to eliminate all randomness:

1. Remove all non-guaranteed secondary effects, make all moves 100% accurate, etc. Obvious enough, though 1HKOs would be overpowered and likely banned.
2. Get rid of crits, fair enough.
3. Get rid of evasion boosting, something people already do for the most part.
4. Get rid of hax items (BrightPowder, Quick Claw, etc.) and abilities (Sand Veil, Quick Draw, etc.)
5. Remove confusion, remove freezes, remove paralysis's chance to prevent an attack, set sleep to an exact number of turns (though widely distributed 100% accurate sleep would be overpowered)
5. Get damage to follow a set formula, rather than being randomnized. This would have a significant effect on how the game plays out, though it makes calculating OHKOs/2HKOs/etc. easier
6. Find a fair way to resolve speed ties. This probably would be the biggest obstacle getting in the way of removing 100% of randomness.

It's obvious that when games come down to RNG it's a bad thing, and this is why evasion, OHKOs, Moody, and at one point Swagger are all banned from any respectable competitive ruleset. There have also been Pokémon banned when too many games came down to speed ties, Mega Gengar in SM Doubles being a good example. But some level of probability management is definitely a real skill, so the true solution may be doing things that limit the influence of RNG (such as allowing more Pokémon in a team and playing matches to three or five). Still, if I could press a button that would eliminate freezes from games, I would do it

 

[charlycicero]

Personally, I would only remove the precision element, or at least the evasion-boosting moves. They are just annoying and I feel they contribute very little to the strategy element of battles. Imo.

edit: also the Confusion aspect. It is too annoying, and usually is very detrimental to the enjoyment of a battle.

By the way, I am talking from the perspective of a playthrough player. I am not a competitive player.