Hey Pokémon Trainers, as we get further into testing and development of our Pokémon tabletop RPG, we thought it’d be fun to give you a peek into the design process. So here’s the first entry in our new dev diary series!

I’ll try to keep the preamble short, but first of all, we have a new working title for what we’ve been calling PTU 2.0 up to now: Pokémon Journeys

We’ve heard feedback requesting a new name to better reflect how big of a paradigmatic change the system is from PTU 1.05, and we also feel we’ve long outgrown the “United” label which was originally meant to juxtapose the system with PTA. So that’s what we’re calling the system…for now. Things may change, as always!

If you haven’t taken a look at our playtest docs and drafts yet, you can see them at this link.

Okay, that out of way, let’s talk about how we’re approaching one of the most exciting shifts in Pokémon Journeys: Every Pokémon will have a custom Move list, including many new Moves we’re writing ourselves to fill holes in a particular Type or mon’s repertoire.

It wasn’t an easy decision to commit to curating Move lists for all mons in Pokémon Journeys. On top of the sheer amount of work it creates for us, it also means we hold more responsibility now for the system’s overall Pokémon balance and can’t pass the buck to Gamefreak when a mon has garbage Moves.

But we believe there are astounding benefits to it. The sheer size and scope of some Pokémons’ TM and Tutor Lists in 1.05 was not only unwieldy, but it made certain Moves far too prevalent, such as Ice Beam and Thunderbolt. Early Gen Pokémon could usually enjoy wide coverage from their TM and Tutor options whereas later Gens appeared to have been assigned those Moves with more scrutiny. Extreme disparities existed within generations too. In contrast to the obvious Move lottery winners like Clefable and the Nidos, the Move lists for Pokémon like Electrode would make you think someone at Gamefreak had it out for them.

Let’s take a look at some example Pokémon Move lists, and I’ll explain what we did along the way. But first, a quick disclaimer: everything in this post is accurate as of time of writing, but if you’re looking at this post weeks or months later, don’t be surprised if our drafts look different.

Case Study: Natu / Xatu

Alright! Here’s Natu’s Natural Move List from PTU 1.05, with Air Slash from Xatu added in:

1 Leer – Normal
1 Peck – Flying
6 Night Shade – Ghost
9 Teleport – Psychic
12 Lucky Chant – Normal
17 Stored Power – Psychic
20 Ominous Wind – Ghost
23 Confuse Ray – Ghost
25 Air Slash – Flying
28 Wish – Normal
33 Psychic – Psychic
36 Miracle Eye – Psychic
39 Psycho Shift – Psychic
44 Future Sight – Psychic
47 Guard Swap – Psychic
47 Power Swap – Psychic
50 Me First – Normal

…It’s awful! No Special STAB until Level 17, and it’s Stored Power with no natural CS Moves at that point. Until then, it’s stuck with Peck and Night Shade, the latter of which is useless at low levels. It doesn’t get another Psychic Move until 33 either. Most of the weird Psychic utility Moves it gets at higher levels aren’t very good in PTU either. In theory, it’s pretty cool that Natu and Xatu get so many utility Moves that let it be an unpredictable trickster in battle, but it’s just not an easy Pokémon to use in practice.

Here’s the current draft for Natu and Xatu’s Move List in Pokémon Journeys. Moves in the left column are Natural Moves, and Moves on the right are learned through Tutoring.

Start	Peck, Psywave, Night Shade, Leer, Lucky Chant, Teleport
Tier 1	Air Cutter, Calm Mind, Confuse Ray, Ominous Wind	Ally Switch, Encourage, Hidden Power
Tier 2	Miracle Eye, Psychic, Psycho Shift, Wish	Light Screen, Reflect, Mystical Fire
Tier 3	Cyclone, Future Sight, Me First, Stat Swap	Chilling Gaze, Roost, Telekinesis
Tier 4	Pain Split, Foretell Doom, Liminal Rites	Mirror Move, Magic Coat, Psych Up
Evo	Evolves to Xatu at Level 7. Xatu Evolution Move: Air Slash

Well, that set of starting Moves doesn’t look any better at first glance. Both Psywave and Night Shade do level-based HP loss in 1.05, and that’s useless at low levels. But wait! We noticed that so many Pokémon get Night Shade at fairly low levels, before it becomes useful, that it made more sense to just turn it into a usable early game Move, as follows:

Night Shade – Ghost Versatile – EOT – DB2 – AC 3 – Range 6, 1 Target – On 17+ the target makes attacks against the user as if Blinded for one full round and cannot make Punish Attacks against the user for that time.

The new Versatile attack type means the Move can be used with either Attack or Special Attack, which helps cement Night Shade as a reliable early game damage Move we can give to Ghosts and other spooky Pokémon.

We gave Psywave a similar treatment, turning it into a high crit range Move to retain some of its luck-based character.

Psywave – Psychic Special – EOT – DB3 – AC 2 – Range 4, 1 Target – 17+: Critically Hits

You might notice the new Move Cyclone on Natu’s list. We created it because there’s not a Special Flying Move that sits between Air Slash and Hurricane. The former is too weak to be a Move learned only at higher Tiers, and Hurricane is a tad specialized and not always the sort of attack a Special-oriented Flying Type wants to use. Cyclone is a bit weaker and can hit fewer potential targets than Hurricane, but it has the advantage of slightly better accuracy, range, and a Hazard-clearing effect.

Cyclone – Flying Special – Scene x2 – DB 5 – AC 4 – 5 sq, Ranged Blast 2, Smite – Cyclone destroys all Smokescreens and Hazards in the targeted squares, regardless of whether it hits. Push all targets hit 1 square away from the targeted squares.

On the whole, the Natu line still learns many utility Moves, much more than most Pokémon do, because that’s a crucial part of its identity and makes it a more interesting Pokémon to use. But it does get enough attacking options to function early on and all of its damaging Moves are more universally useful rather than niche Moves such as Stored Power.

We’ve done a bit to touch up how useful some of the tricky utility Moves the Natu line gets too. For example:

Miracle Eye – Psychic Status – EOT – Minor Action – Self – For the rest of the user’s turn, their Psychic-Type attacks gain the Reliable Keyword, ignore Dark’s Immunity to Psychic damage, and cannot be Intercepted.

Stat Swap – Psychic Status – Scene – Minor Action – Range 8, 1 Target, Reliable – Stat Swap cannot miss. Choose Power or Guard. If you chose Power, you and your target trade Attack and Special Attack values with each other for one full round. If you chose Guard, you and your target trade Defense and Special Defense values with each other for one full round.

Finally, the video games didn’t offer us enough in the way of Status Moves that were strong enough to be classified under Tier 4, so we wrote our own there too. Liminal Rites is a custom Move I like a lot for being both a potential damaging Move as well as a form of interesting utility.

Liminal Rites – Ghost Status – Scene – Move Action – Self, Priority – Liminal Rites must be declared as Priority at the start of a round. Choose Burst 1, 2, or 3 around the user. For the rest of the Round, whenever a target enters or exits the chosen area of effect, the user may perform a Ghost-Typed DB 5 Special Attack against the target as a Free Action with a +3 bonus to Accuracy Roll. Targets hit by this attack are Flinched. If no attacks are triggered as a result of Liminal Rites, the Frequency is not expended.

Turning more Moves into Move or Minor Actions has opened up the design space for Moves that have interesting effects but are too weak for anyone to consider using as a Standard Action. They also complicate your decision on which Moves to learn and keep in a good way—do you want to pick up another coverage Move or something to fill the Minor Actions you’d be otherwise passing up each round?

Case Study: Wooper vs Mudkip Lines

One challenge we’ve run into with custom Move lists, aside from the obvious enormous amount of work it is to curate Moves for 800+ Pokémon, is how to handle species lines that on-face seem fairly similar.

Take the Wooper and Mudkip lines, for example. Both are bulky Water/Ground Types that lean physical and get a lot of Moves starting with “Mud”. Abilities aside, that’s fairly similar. Luckily for us, they’re already distinguished from each other in their coverage—mainly that the Mudkip line gets nice Fighting and Rock Moves naturally in addition to its STAB Types and the Wooper line gets diddly squat. Here’s what we did with the two.

First, the Wooper line Move List:

Start	Water Gun, Bubble Slide, Tail Whip, Mud Sport, Mud Shot
Tier 1	Bulldoze, Yawn, Slime Tackle, Haze	Encourage, Glomp, Safeguard
Tier 2	Slam, Play Rough, Aqua Tail, Amnesia	Zen Headbutt, Encore, Ice Punch
Tier 3	Earthquake, Muddy Water, Recover, Sludge Wave	Counter, Iron Tail, Toxic
Tier 4	Carefree Smile, Gunk Shot, Waterfall	Joyful Bound, Belly Drum, Endure
Evo	Evolves to Quagsire at 7. Quagsire Evolution Move: Stockpile

Now, the Mudkip line Move List:

Start	Tackle, Growl, Water Gun, Mud-Slap, Foresight
Tier 1	Bide, Mud Shot, Rock Throw, Water Pulse	Double Kick, Bulldoze, Bite
Tier 2	Take Down, Water Pledge, Mud Bomb, Dive	Strength, Power-Up Punch, Whirlpool
Tier 3	Stomping Tantrum, Stone Edge, Protect, Swagger	Counter, Avalanche, Bulk Up
Tier 4	Hammer Arm, Rest, Sleep Talk	Hydro Cannon, Wide Guard, Giga Impact
Evo	Evolves to Marshtomp at Level 5. Evolves to Swampert at Level 9. Marshtomp Evolution Move: Stomp Swampert Evolution Move: Muddy Water

Both Pokémon start off similarly, but in Tier 1 you can already start to see differences. Where the Mudkip line gets natural Rock coverage as it does in the video games, we gave the Wooper line Poison coverage to match its lore about coating itself in poisonous ooze. The Wooper line also plays a bit more support and has more AOE Moves where the Mudkip line focuses on single target offense with great natural coverage. The late game options offer each line different tricks they can do with synergistic Moves—the Mudkip line gets Rest Talking while the Wooper line gets Belly Drum, with Endure to help guarantee it has a turn to attack after using it.

Another change we made to accommodate Pokémon of different Stat leanings is to make all the Mud Moves Versatile. The Pokémon for whom Mud Moves make sense conceptually are split all over the place between Physical and Special, and rather than write a new equivalent set of Moves for the Physical set, we decided to make those Moves equally useful to both.

Next Time: I’d like to talk about how we think through playtesting—how we interpret and examine playtest sessions, what makes for good playtest feedback, and some examples of insights we’ve found and decisions we’ve made based off of our playtests.

As always, you can find us on our Discord server if you wanna give us feedback or just pop in to chat.