Pokemon Umbral Discussion 38: Shenanigans At Dawn, Sir!

[Geminex]

Actually, Adrenaline Surges don't stack.

They do, ever since we came up with the whole "reuse accessories for 50 rage" thing. I'm pretty sure AB said so somewhere along the line.

"If anything, you could say that as Renny is growing up, he is hiding behind his pokemons less and less (out of actually having the ability to contribute on his own merits) but still trust them to defend him and his loved ones. And no, I'm not having him go Half-Demon at all. I'll leave that to Pierce/Impact and anyone else."

Yeah. Just... no.
First, that could just as easily be accomplished by going pokebrid, as I assumed you would. Instead, you're going Slayer. So I really don't think that's much of a justification.

And secondly, there's one hell of a difference between "Developing Independence" (which would warrant a few levels, even of Slayer) and "Becoming, Primarily, A Soldier". And seriously, to make that happen plausibly, you'd have to turn Renny's character development around quite a bit. And by "turn" I mean "gratingly wrench" and by "quite a bit" I mean "by a complete 180 degrees". There's just such a major difference between what he's like now, and what a level 3 Overblade should be like.

Mind you, if you can pull it off, sure. Great! If you have plans how to engineer Renny's disillusionment with pokemon, build up his cynicism, make him so much more Brutal that he can go from Purest Form Of Trainer to Heavy Front Line Soldier, excellent!
It'll be refreshing to see him develop that strongly, let go of his pokemon, his Perfect Idealism. It'll be hard, of course, because it'd represent a pretty drastic shift, but if that's your intention, sure. Go ahead. You have my support, I'll do what I can to help.

But see, I don't think that's your intention. I think your intention is to have his development continue going the way it's always been going, with a few changes towards independence and Growing-Up. Changes that wouldn't be utterly insignificant, and that, like I said, would certainly warrant a few levels of pokebrid or even Slayer. But I'm pretty sure that there will be a very significant discrepancy between the amount of development you're gonna bring, and what'd be necessary to justify the fact that, once again, the majority of his levels will be in the class that was originally introduced as the one whose job it is to kill pokemon.

I can't tell you what to do here. But if your intention is to play a believable, fun character, you should probably reallocate some of those levels. Because I think what you're planning to do is less "good role-playing" and more "min-maxing your character and giving character development the finger". And that's bullshit.

Mind you, in the interest of balance that Gem is promoting which I agreed to, you do realize that Demons just means more customization in their abilities and that demonhood doesn't automatically mean that you are improportionally stronger with equal or less ranks than someone who has more ranks as a strictly fighting class. As things stand, Renny would technically be the better fighter 1 on 1 (although you'd have powerful single hitting techniques with that Aura Blade and so).

As for this...
Demonhood pretty much stands for pure and utter customization, here. If Drac decides to go full frontal assaulter with his demon levels then there's a good chance that he'd be as strong as Renny, if not stronger in one-on-one combat (since those demon levels he takes would effectively be "fighting levels"). Impact, on the other hand, would be much more of a tactical supporter, cause that's what I'm doing with my levels. Demonhood levels aren't disproportionately stronger than standard levels, of course. It's just a bit easier to specialize with them.

At this point I'm also gonna recommend that the bonuses for getting Slayer 8 (Overblade 3) get reevaluated. Two attacks per turn does seem a bit wonky. I still maintain that, compared to Trainers, Slayers are just a bit underpowered. But getting two attacks per turn would do more than just overcompensate for that. And since none of the other classes get anything comparable... Maybe try to find another way to finally even the odds?

Anyway, assuming we're right about what we think that change would do, I would propose making it so that it only takes ten ranks in either of the classes that make up the dual-class.

...
What, seriously? I'd be fine with it taking 4 ranks in both classes. But I think that 4 should be the minimum for either class.
And is the support system even still on the table? Cause maybe we could combine some of this.

Cheerful Back-up: Renny has trained his pokemons to fight effectively in other people's names in their defense, although their spirits remain highest when they fight for him.
Effect: Upon use, when Renny would gain rage for one or both pokemons attacking, that rage can be given to someone else. If neither pokemon does this, Renny gains one additional attack's worth of base rage for himself.

This is allright, I guess. Except for that last bit. Why should he gain rage from this? Especially for not using it?
And besides, 5 rage per turn is, I feel, stronger than this is supposed to be. The way I see it, this is supposed to be the ability to get a minor advantage, in exchange for some minor rage. Not give you rage for free. The ability to transfer 5 or even 10 rage to an ally? Sure. Get 5 rage yourself? Eeeeeh. It's what trainer attacks have apparently been doing all along, and which I don't think they should do.

In regards to the Slayer weapons, that might be feasible. Which weapons were you thinking of replacing with which attacks? Cause I think that even if you forsake weapons for attacks, you should be limited to one Slayer-strength attack per element, for a total of... 17 attacks? And of course only have an inventory of 3/6 at any time.