1. Luftballon
Banned
- Pronoun
- it
Re: Pokémon Registration Office
luftballon9:
====== drifloon sigthing attempt 9 ======
pseudosci magibabble yay
[Puff] drifloon (f)
Body modification: Living Force
All drifloon have learned, when young, that the proper course of action when faced with a potential threat is to gather as much energy as possible (in fact, gather the energy beforehand if threats are expected) and then blast any targets at maximum power. If it is a fellow drifloon, it will be a great waste of energy, but nobody will get hurt; but anything else is unlikely to want to stay much longer.
The necessity of the intermediary step to gather energy usually goes unquestioned -- it seems obvious, after all: it is generally not possible to gather that much energy while attacking, so one has to prepare it before attacking.
The learned realize that justifications of this sort are more or less lies to children -- more safety guidelines than physical reality; being only barely physical beings themselves, drifloon thinkers noticed, early on, that there is a certain energy reservoir present in all pokémon life which is not difficult to access and trivial to draw energy from -- the same, incidentally, which powers most attacks. They called it vis viva then, though as time passed, it was increasingly called the living force. (Literal scientific accuracy seems to have fallen by the wayside in favor of blind idiot translation.)
The living force reservoir stores a tremendous amount of energy; certain drawbacks, however, make its use rather impractical. For one, the threshold at which directly accessing the living force is more practical than expending energy the usual way is rather high; and second, having the massive amounts of energy involved (is enough to be massive, after all) drawn out of one's body is a bit unhealthy. Furthermore, energy drawn from the living force reservoir tends to be somewhat tainted by the elemental energies associated with the source pokémon -- and, thus, for drifloon, not safe to blast at each other with. (There is, after all, something to be said for safety.)
When Puff noticed, however, her reaction did not include either practicality or safety concerns. Simply throwing the large amounts of energy is at least a useful use, after all, even if a bit inefficient; as a resident of Asber, Puff holds a complete disregard for health and safety guidelines, both for herself and for others; and, as a ghost (even of a type not especially known for cursing), she recognizes that if phenomenal cosmic power requires sacrifices, the sacrifices aren't actually that bit a deal as long as one gets enough value out of it.
And in this case, speed is power. Or perhaps it is better to say power is the ability to cram as more effect into the same amount of time. Strength makes one's actions more effective; defenses make others' actions less effective than one's own; being fast enough lets one prevent others from taking some actions altogether; but ultimately, some actions are simply more effective than others, and those other actions are entirely wastes of time. If the cost of the most effective action is greater, then let it be greater -- if it gets the job done faster, it still saves that most invaluable resource, time.
Still, it is preferable to foist the cost on someone else -- which is precisely what the living force reservoir is most practical for: if one wanted to use one's own energy to do something, it might be more practical to simply use one's own energy the usual way; but when one wishes to use another's energy, there simply aren't that many alternatives.
There is the small problem of accessing another's energy reservoir, which can actually be quite difficult if they are unwilling, but this does not diminish just how valuable it can be when one does need it. For most, it would take too much time and too much effort to use in battle; but to Puff, the appeal of semi-phenomenal, nearly cosmic power outweighs the mild annoyance of actually having to put effort into working on doing it quickly. Indeed, having developed her technique so, Puff no longer sees value in the usual intermediate step; she refuses to use it on principle.
This power is fundamentally the same as that invoked by Secret Power, but Puff's use of it is irrevocably tainted by the manifestation of her Hidden Power; as such, Puff is unable to call upon either of those effects normally.
Effects: Puff, normally inclined to drift with the winds, ceases motion for an instant, spreading her "arms" upward. The source pokémon begins to glow with a bright light, then to tremble slightly as the light breaks apart into myriad glowing droplets, which rise and rejoin as a great glowing orb. As the orb absorbs the last of the droplets, it flies off toward the target.
Puff need not use Stockpile (cannot use Stockpile) before using Spit Up or Swallow; instead, a "source" for the energy cost (a specific amount which must be between 10% and 20%) is selected in addition to the target. As part of the execution of the move, the source expends the energy cost and takes damage equal to one-half the energy cost (rounded down). The source selected must be an ally or otherwise noted (in its commands) to be "willing" to act as Puff's energy source.
If Puff is selected as the source, assume the cost of Spit Up or Swallow to be negligible; otherwise, Puff expends an additional 3% of her own energy in the execution.
The moves originate from the source pokémon's position, which Puff does not necessarily control; if so, the source pokémon must have a clear path to and be in range of the target when Puff attempts to use to move for the move to take effect on the intended target. (Assume Puff has enough control over her energy orbs to maneuver them.) Puff herself need only be within range; a clear path is not quite necessary.
Puff's Spit Up is a physical energy attack which takes on the source pokémon's primary type with damage fixed at 1.5 times the amount of energy expended (rounded down); as a fixed-damage attack, its damage class and type are usually relevant in case of immunities and certain effects which act on those attributes.
Puff's can select a target to be healed by Swallow instead of necessarily healing herself.
Puff can evaluate and understand conditionals based on the numerical value of a pokémon's energy.
Movepool changes: -Hidden Power, -Secret Power, -Stockpile.
===== Notes =====
on Spit Up: the efficiency goes to less than or equal to 3 damage to 2 energy and 1 hp, with maximum of 30%/20%/10% a shot. this ... well, to be sure, it is large, but not really excessively so. consider that, say, a 0 exp charizard's blast burn is 18% damage for 11% energy, an efficiency of some 1.64 -- indeed, the same applies for any STAB user of any of these, as well as Head Smash and possibly Focus Punch. this is ... a common damage amount, if we momentarily ignore typing, with the wide spread of hyper beam and giga impact -- namely, almost every fully-evolved pokémon and then a few NFE. but okay, drifloon is immune to normal; but Thunder and Blizzard are fairly widely distributed, and occur with Rain Dance and Hail quite frequently, so let us consider a SE non-STAB BP 110 Acc 100 attack as an abstraction, with 15% damage per action at 7% cost, which is 2.14 efficiency. Spit Up has a defined 1.5 efficiency, and incurs a rather significant 1/3 damage recoil; as healing usually comes at 2:1 (which it isn't actually, due to action economy), putting it down to a 1.2 efficiency. mooching others' energy drops it further down; and, since I have to supply the source anyway, it should only allow blasting through an ally's energy ridiculously quickly under most circumstances. perhaps a bit to quickly, but eh, you tell me.
on Swallow: at 2.5x energy cost minus 0.5x energy cost, this swallow is about even with other direct recovery and with heal pulse, and is further limited by Unnerve and Embargo, which don't affect conventional healing. with the energy cap reduced to 20%, the healing cap goes down to 50%, on par with conventional healing; but taking that damage cuts it down to net 40%. compared to two-turn Swallow, this version is 25% faster and 20% costlier. healing others is ... strictly less effective than a heal pulse, and often worse than pain split. seems reasonably balanced -- drifloon already did have direct healing, I'm just making it ... pretty much even, marginally better on average, I think? but is more a thematic thing than anything, so.
luftballon9:
====== drifloon sigthing attempt 9 ======
pseudosci magibabble yay
[Puff] drifloon (f)
Body modification: Living Force
All drifloon have learned, when young, that the proper course of action when faced with a potential threat is to gather as much energy as possible (in fact, gather the energy beforehand if threats are expected) and then blast any targets at maximum power. If it is a fellow drifloon, it will be a great waste of energy, but nobody will get hurt; but anything else is unlikely to want to stay much longer.
The necessity of the intermediary step to gather energy usually goes unquestioned -- it seems obvious, after all: it is generally not possible to gather that much energy while attacking, so one has to prepare it before attacking.
The learned realize that justifications of this sort are more or less lies to children -- more safety guidelines than physical reality; being only barely physical beings themselves, drifloon thinkers noticed, early on, that there is a certain energy reservoir present in all pokémon life which is not difficult to access and trivial to draw energy from -- the same, incidentally, which powers most attacks. They called it vis viva then, though as time passed, it was increasingly called the living force. (Literal scientific accuracy seems to have fallen by the wayside in favor of blind idiot translation.)
The living force reservoir stores a tremendous amount of energy; certain drawbacks, however, make its use rather impractical. For one, the threshold at which directly accessing the living force is more practical than expending energy the usual way is rather high; and second, having the massive amounts of energy involved (is enough to be massive, after all) drawn out of one's body is a bit unhealthy. Furthermore, energy drawn from the living force reservoir tends to be somewhat tainted by the elemental energies associated with the source pokémon -- and, thus, for drifloon, not safe to blast at each other with. (There is, after all, something to be said for safety.)
When Puff noticed, however, her reaction did not include either practicality or safety concerns. Simply throwing the large amounts of energy is at least a useful use, after all, even if a bit inefficient; as a resident of Asber, Puff holds a complete disregard for health and safety guidelines, both for herself and for others; and, as a ghost (even of a type not especially known for cursing), she recognizes that if phenomenal cosmic power requires sacrifices, the sacrifices aren't actually that bit a deal as long as one gets enough value out of it.
And in this case, speed is power. Or perhaps it is better to say power is the ability to cram as more effect into the same amount of time. Strength makes one's actions more effective; defenses make others' actions less effective than one's own; being fast enough lets one prevent others from taking some actions altogether; but ultimately, some actions are simply more effective than others, and those other actions are entirely wastes of time. If the cost of the most effective action is greater, then let it be greater -- if it gets the job done faster, it still saves that most invaluable resource, time.
Still, it is preferable to foist the cost on someone else -- which is precisely what the living force reservoir is most practical for: if one wanted to use one's own energy to do something, it might be more practical to simply use one's own energy the usual way; but when one wishes to use another's energy, there simply aren't that many alternatives.
There is the small problem of accessing another's energy reservoir, which can actually be quite difficult if they are unwilling, but this does not diminish just how valuable it can be when one does need it. For most, it would take too much time and too much effort to use in battle; but to Puff, the appeal of semi-phenomenal, nearly cosmic power outweighs the mild annoyance of actually having to put effort into working on doing it quickly. Indeed, having developed her technique so, Puff no longer sees value in the usual intermediate step; she refuses to use it on principle.
This power is fundamentally the same as that invoked by Secret Power, but Puff's use of it is irrevocably tainted by the manifestation of her Hidden Power; as such, Puff is unable to call upon either of those effects normally.
Effects: Puff, normally inclined to drift with the winds, ceases motion for an instant, spreading her "arms" upward. The source pokémon begins to glow with a bright light, then to tremble slightly as the light breaks apart into myriad glowing droplets, which rise and rejoin as a great glowing orb. As the orb absorbs the last of the droplets, it flies off toward the target.
Puff need not use Stockpile (cannot use Stockpile) before using Spit Up or Swallow; instead, a "source" for the energy cost (a specific amount which must be between 10% and 20%) is selected in addition to the target. As part of the execution of the move, the source expends the energy cost and takes damage equal to one-half the energy cost (rounded down). The source selected must be an ally or otherwise noted (in its commands) to be "willing" to act as Puff's energy source.
If Puff is selected as the source, assume the cost of Spit Up or Swallow to be negligible; otherwise, Puff expends an additional 3% of her own energy in the execution.
The moves originate from the source pokémon's position, which Puff does not necessarily control; if so, the source pokémon must have a clear path to and be in range of the target when Puff attempts to use to move for the move to take effect on the intended target. (Assume Puff has enough control over her energy orbs to maneuver them.) Puff herself need only be within range; a clear path is not quite necessary.
Puff's Spit Up is a physical energy attack which takes on the source pokémon's primary type with damage fixed at 1.5 times the amount of energy expended (rounded down); as a fixed-damage attack, its damage class and type are usually relevant in case of immunities and certain effects which act on those attributes.
Puff's can select a target to be healed by Swallow instead of necessarily healing herself.
Puff can evaluate and understand conditionals based on the numerical value of a pokémon's energy.
Movepool changes: -Hidden Power, -Secret Power, -Stockpile.
===== Notes =====
on Spit Up: the efficiency goes to less than or equal to 3 damage to 2 energy and 1 hp, with maximum of 30%/20%/10% a shot. this ... well, to be sure, it is large, but not really excessively so. consider that, say, a 0 exp charizard's blast burn is 18% damage for 11% energy, an efficiency of some 1.64 -- indeed, the same applies for any STAB user of any of these, as well as Head Smash and possibly Focus Punch. this is ... a common damage amount, if we momentarily ignore typing, with the wide spread of hyper beam and giga impact -- namely, almost every fully-evolved pokémon and then a few NFE. but okay, drifloon is immune to normal; but Thunder and Blizzard are fairly widely distributed, and occur with Rain Dance and Hail quite frequently, so let us consider a SE non-STAB BP 110 Acc 100 attack as an abstraction, with 15% damage per action at 7% cost, which is 2.14 efficiency. Spit Up has a defined 1.5 efficiency, and incurs a rather significant 1/3 damage recoil; as healing usually comes at 2:1 (which it isn't actually, due to action economy), putting it down to a 1.2 efficiency. mooching others' energy drops it further down; and, since I have to supply the source anyway, it should only allow blasting through an ally's energy ridiculously quickly under most circumstances. perhaps a bit to quickly, but eh, you tell me.
on Swallow: at 2.5x energy cost minus 0.5x energy cost, this swallow is about even with other direct recovery and with heal pulse, and is further limited by Unnerve and Embargo, which don't affect conventional healing. with the energy cap reduced to 20%, the healing cap goes down to 50%, on par with conventional healing; but taking that damage cuts it down to net 40%. compared to two-turn Swallow, this version is 25% faster and 20% costlier. healing others is ... strictly less effective than a heal pulse, and often worse than pain split. seems reasonably balanced -- drifloon already did have direct healing, I'm just making it ... pretty much even, marginally better on average, I think? but is more a thematic thing than anything, so.
