PMD Crossroads - World-Building and Story so Far

[Nekomata]

Pokemon Mystery Dungeon Crossroads
World Building and the Story So Far!

This thread is to create and track the world-building progress of the Community Comic. We are not allowed to plan or plot things for the comic's story, but we can gather here to discuss world-rules and how they should apply to the comic. This will be done to maintain consistency in how the different writers treat the world.

For example, the types of things we need to discuss would be: Is this a PMD world in which humans existed in myths? Yes? No? Or is this 100% a Pokemon world. How many moves can Pokemon learn? Do explorer badges teleport teams out of dungeons? Does normal water physically harm fire types- or only water type attacks? We can't have a Flareon swimming on one panel then have a drop of water from the top of a cave KO her!

As the comic starts and new ideas and places are introduced, we'll log them. If our characters end up in a forest, we'll mark that the forest was near their previous location. If one artists/author introduces a guild, we'll write down what we know about the guild. Heck, we can even try to add a bit to what is seen in the comic. So long as no plot-related decisions are made, it's fair game. It's also very much subject to change if not officially presented in the comic.

If someone working on a page wants to dispute or go against anything here, they may do so within reason. They may not, however, change anything that has already been set on page.


Established World Rules

• Reviver Seeds do not revive the dead. They can revive fainted Pokemon, but not to full health.
• Fire Pokemon are generally weakened by water but can, in most cases, swim or come into contact with water without serious repercussion.
• Explorer Badges cannot be used unless the user is standing still. It also has limited charge for one trip. This is to prevent 'Get out of jail free' cards. It may also teleport enemy Pokemon if they are in close proximity to the user.
• Carnivorous Pokemon exist.
• No move limit currently in place, but natural growth should be used.

Locations and Notable Objects

• Seaspire City: City that overlooks the ocean. Near a mountain that resembles a Noivern.

Story Recap

WIP

Navigation

- Rules, Guidelines, About, and Q&A
- The Comic Thread!
- General Discussion
- Characters and References
- World Building and Story so Far!
- Character Creation Contest!

- Comic Tips, Tricks, Guides, and Resources
- PMDXR on Smackjeeves

[Scytherwolf]

First of all, I'm all for allowing fire types to swim. I think it's silly when people have them be harmed just by touching a puddle of water. xD

One thing I'd like to request, however, is that reviver seeds don't work as a 'literally bring someone back to life' thing. I feel like they should work more like revives in the main games do, and having an instant cure for death would remove any danger or suspense the story would have. Same with a character getting a major injury or something - there shouldn't be a ton of instant healing. Gotta have some sense of real danger.

For pokemon moves, I'm fine with both limiting them to four and with having them know whatever moves their species can. Whatever most people prefer on that one.

I feel like if we decide explorer badges can teleport, there should be some limitations on it (even if it's just as simple as one time it stops working for whatever reason) so there can be dangerous situations the characters can't easily get out of.

Humans, I'm not sure right now. I'd be fine with no mention of humans at all, but it would also be kinda cool to have them be myths that are talked about in this PMD world.

I'll come back with more stuff when I think of it.

[The Nonexistent Tazz]

First off, love this idea. Can't stress it enough. Funnily enough, I had this idea for this before for a story, but never got around to writing it; using the PMD world as ideas for basically a parody of PxR peeps and wanky zany hijinx.

Second off, there's a lot of PMD comics out there. A lot. There are a lot of comics, in general, that star Pokemon and only Pokemon, too, humans known or not. I'm not sure if we really really want a super-different world, but I feel like while our own ideas may persist, I want something, just something, even just one thing, that puts this world as vastly different from other worlds like it. Which raises the question of if we really want to start worldbuilding early.

I do have a few ideas... And a few questions. I'll just state the ideas first.

-Make several Legendary Pokemon wholly fictitious but not all of them. By 'fictitious,' I mean 'In-game they are real, but in the canon we have established they are nonexistent.' This assumes we'll have Pokemon Religion play a big role or such, but it can still hole up some big surprises; this way, we could have several pantheons and local deities, some of which are filled with fake Legendaries, while others have Legends that actually exist (and some have both, too). This allows us to play the game of 'is this a real god-like being or just a poser,' and if we do say a lot of legendaries are just regular Pokemon posing as local deities, actually encountering a genuine Legendary (even one like Keldeo or Uxie) may be a huge boss-level deal, especially if they're not friendly. As an alternative, we could have a reasonably singular pantheon that works differently from standard Pokemon fare, and keep our focus squarely on a manageable group of Legends.

-Make the Pokemon square off against very unfamiliar forces. And I don't just mean other Pokemon or altered Pokemon either, or even Ultra Beasts-I mean things that very well aren't established in the canon of Pokemon. The most influential example I can give for this kind of thing is the Trials of Juno, specifically the local variant on the Legions of Hell, though we could probably do something else.

-Make anomalous Pokemon. By which I mean Pokemon of a kin to the Regional Variants of Alola, only on a much wider scale of potential. Like, a ridiculously giant Pokemon, or a Pokemon that is basically the merger of two Pokemon at once (including a Legend) or ones with implausible attacks (like Judgement on a lowly Bidoof.) Have the protagonist be anomalous somehow. Shiny, halfbreed legend, stupid-strong attack, or something else; something weird and very different, beyond maybe once being human.

As for questions, I really only have three:

-How are we going to potray the Mystery Dungeon enemies? Bandits? Hopelessly brainwashed victims of the Mystery Dungeon phenomena? Constructs of the Mystery Dungeon itself? Will we even include legitimate Mystery Dungeons?

-Are we going to focus on a core cast of characters, or a wide cast of characters? Like, how many secondary characters, protagonists and factions will we factor in? I believe that, with the way the Character Design Contest is worded, that we'll only have one major hero and thus a Primary Protagonist; but what about the Protagonists around THE Protagionist? What about his antagonists, for that matter?

-What's our Genre? This sounds simple, but it's not. Are we going to be like a Shonen Anime? Or are we (for whatever reason) going full Magical Girl? Sticking to the core rulebook? Full Lovecraftian dive or other horror? Romcom? Parody wherein the main character wields the almighty power of the stick of Rule 63, and wields Genderbending amongst his/her/their/tem/yes combat maneuvers?

My artistic talent is literally beneath the level of XKCD. It's not going to improve to a manageable level in any quick time period with all that's already on my plate. This is all I can help you with, but hey. It's something, right? I can help storyboard and characterize, if nothing else.

[Nekomata]

First off, love this idea. Can't stress it enough. Funnily enough, I had this idea for this before for a story, but never got around to writing it; using the PMD world as ideas for basically a parody of PxR peeps and wanky zany hijinx.

Second off, there's a lot of PMD comics out there. A lot. There are a lot of comics, in general, that star Pokemon and only Pokemon, too, humans known or not. I'm not sure if we really really want a super-different world, but I feel like while our own ideas may persist, I want something, just something, even just one thing, that puts this world as vastly different from other worlds like it. Which raises the question of if we really want to start worldbuilding early.


Please remember that this world-building session is more to set RULES on things like reviver seeds, badge teleportations, how we'll treat death, etc. than it is to generate story ideas. The whole point of this project is to make a comic without any story plotting. We're not going to be making a masterpiece story- but we do want to make a logical story with a naturally progressing plot. I'd love to find ways to make the story unique, but we can't plot. Some of your below world-building things are VERY much on the line between setting rules and story/plot ideas.

I do have a few ideas... And a few questions. I'll just state the ideas first.

-Make several Legendary Pokemon wholly fictitious but not all of them. By 'fictitious,' I mean 'In-game they are real, but in the canon we have established they are nonexistent.' This assumes we'll have Pokemon Religion play a big role or such, but it can still hole up some big surprises; this way, we could have several pantheons and local deities, some of which are filled with fake Legendaries, while others have Legends that actually exist (and some have both, too). This allows us to play the game of 'is this a real god-like being or just a poser,' and if we do say a lot of legendaries are just regular Pokemon posing as local deities, actually encountering a genuine Legendary (even one like Keldeo or Uxie) may be a huge boss-level deal, especially if they're not friendly. As an alternative, we could have a reasonably singular pantheon that works differently from standard Pokemon fare, and keep our focus squarely on a manageable group of Legends.

This is very much on the edge of plotting ideas/story stuff. If the writers/artists want to add a religious/mythical element to the legendaries, they'll have to do it on page before it can officially be added to the world-lore.

-Make the Pokemon square off against very unfamiliar forces. And I don't just mean other Pokemon or altered Pokemon either, or even Ultra Beasts-I mean things that very well aren't established in the canon of Pokemon. The most influential example I can give for this kind of thing is the Trials of Juno, specifically the local variant on the Legions of Hell, though we could probably do something else.

Again, we're not plotting stuff here. We're setting rules, not ideas.

-Make anomalous Pokemon. By which I mean Pokemon of a kin to the Regional Variants of Alola, only on a much wider scale of potential. Like, a ridiculously giant Pokemon, or a Pokemon that is basically the merger of two Pokemon at once (including a Legend) or ones with implausible attacks (like Judgement on a lowly Bidoof.) Have the protagonist be anomalous somehow. Shiny, halfbreed legend, stupid-strong attack, or something else; something weird and very different, beyond maybe once being human.

Personally, I'd prefer to avoid using any sort of fakemon. Otherwise we'll end up with nothing BUT because people will want to add them in like crazy. Having some slight feature variations is fine, but it still needs to fit within the official designs.

As for questions, I really only have three:

-How are we going to potray the Mystery Dungeon enemies? Bandits? Hopelessly brainwashed victims of the Mystery Dungeon phenomena? Constructs of the Mystery Dungeon itself? Will we even include legitimate Mystery Dungeons?

Once again, that's up to those who make the comic pages. Once this is established in comic, then it will be added here.

-Are we going to focus on a core cast of characters, or a wide cast of characters? Like, how many secondary characters, protagonists and factions will we factor in? I believe that, with the way the Character Design Contest is worded, that we'll only have one major hero and thus a Primary Protagonist; but what about the Protagonists around THE Protagionist? What about his antagonists, for that matter?

Ideally, we'll focus on a core cast of characters. We've got a contest going for the creation of the main character. I'll discuss the contest further (I did that post half dead/tired) regarding runner-ups and what not. We need to establish the guidelines for how we'll introduce any contest entries that aren't the main character itself. Again, we don't want to PLAN anything or tell the artists 'YOU HAVE TO ADD THIS CHARACTER IN' - we want to give as much creative freedom to the artists without giving them full control to do whatever the hell they want. The addition of new characters will be one of those things that are regulated by the people running this comic (just me right now.) There will be more room to add in characters in the early stages of the comics, but once we feel that a core cast has been established, rules on that will get tighter.

-What's our Genre? This sounds simple, but it's not. Are we going to be like a Shonen Anime? Or are we (for whatever reason) going full Magical Girl? Sticking to the core rulebook? Full Lovecraftian dive or other horror? Romcom? Parody wherein the main character wields the almighty power of the stick of Rule 63, and wields Genderbending amongst his/her/their/tem/yes combat maneuvers?

Again, we're trying to leave things as open as possible for the artists. I can say that intense gore/horror won't be allowed- or excessive shipping and NSFW content. I'd say we're going for a fun adventure with a sense of urgency, but again- that's not for me to decide.

My artistic talent is literally beneath the level of XKCD. It's not going to improve to a manageable level in any quick time period with all that's already on my plate. This is all I can help you with, but hey. It's something, right? I can help storyboard and characterize, if nothing else.

We're not allowed to storyboard! Just log in world-rules as they are created. Of course, if you want to help you can request to write the script for a page and have someone else draw it, but you'd have to contact artists about that. Remember- plotting is now allowed. World building stuff will be logged as the comic goes. If one artist establishes that Legendaries are myth, then we can add it into the lore. If another artist later has it be so that legendaries actually exist- or confirms their nonexistence, then we edit the lore. Things like that will be flexible, other thing like... say, if one artist has it so chestnuts explode if roasted, then that isn't flexible. They will always explode when roasted (random example).

First of all, I'm all for allowing fire types to swim. I think it's silly when people have them be harmed just by touching a puddle of water. xD

Thank you! I always found the idea that fire types could be harmed by still/non-attack water. I've always imaged it as they don't particularly like getting wet since it weakens their natural fire abilities and leaves them vulnerable, but unless you're a Charmander or something, it's not

One thing I'd like to request, however, is that reviver seeds don't work as a 'literally bring someone back to life' thing. I feel like they should work more like revives in the main games do, and having an instant cure for death would remove any danger or suspense the story would have. Same with a character getting a major injury or something - there shouldn't be a ton of instant healing. Gotta have some sense of real danger.

I'm with you on the 'dead is dead' boat. I don't want to see reviver seeds being some undo button. They can act as some sort of wake-up/energizing health item though. Helps wake up unconscious Pokemon.

For pokemon moves, I'm fine with both limiting them to four and with having them know whatever moves their species can. Whatever most people prefer on that one.

I think 4 or 6 would be good!

I feel like if we decide explorer badges can teleport, there should be some limitations on it (even if it's just as simple as one time it stops working for whatever reason) so there can be dangerous situations the characters can't easily get out of.

Yeah, I'd like to see limitations on back teleports if we have it. Maybe it requires being charged and can only warp x number of Pokemon before running out of juice.

Humans, I'm not sure right now. I'd be fine with no mention of humans at all, but it would also be kinda cool to have them be myths that are talked about in this PMD world.

I don't want to draw humans. xD So personally, i don't care as long as they don't have to appear.

I'll come back with more stuff when I think of it.

My responses are bolded/red

Current topics:

- Fire Pokemon and Water
- Reviver Seeds
- How many moves?

[Scytherwolf]

Yes, I like the idea of reviver seeds being able to 'revive' (as in wake up/energize) a fainted pokemon.

As for mystery dungeons, I personally would like to see actual dungeons in the comic. Places that are never the same each time you enter them, so it's always an unpredictable maze.

Another thing is, what do the pokemon eat? Particularly the carnivores. Do they get meat from somewhere or should we just have everyone able to eat berries? I'd prefer carnivores to still be meat eaters (though of course they can eat berries too, especially for their healing properties such as pecha berries curing poison or whatever), but I wouldn't mind a ton if we simplified it to have everyone eat berries either. I'd like to see other people's thoughts on this.

[Suicune's Fire]

I'm reeeeeally bad with drawing backgrounds, but I would be up for the challenge of drawing mystery dungeons.

I have never had my fire types "allergic" to water. XD I literally have a flareon swimming in one of the first chapters of a story of mine. I mean, it makes her feel uncomfortable and she's certainly not keen to do it again, but it doesn't harm her. Like what's been said, an open flame is different.

I like the idea of having more than 4 moves. I know that the 4 move limitation is just to make in-game battling fair, but it shouldn't apply to less confining settings such as a comic or a story. 6 seems alright, but I wouldn't mind having more. For my own 'circle' of stories and what have you, I set the limit at 8.

Badge teleportation is tricky. I too do not think it should be a get-out-of-jail-free card, but I also don't want to have the awkwardness of going to a 40f dungeon and rescuing someone on the 3rd floor and then being stuck there for the remainder of the 37f. Perhaps it only works out of range of enemies, such as in certain games where teleportation or fast travel is only available when you're 100% safe?

[Chibi Altaria]

I got confused because @Nekomata you said "world rules" but the title says "world building and story so far", which means I thought we'd get to discuss the story as well and create that foundation. xD But you just dismissed pretty much all of what Tazz said, so I assume you mean rules only?

[Nekomata]

@Lunar Latias

(Will respond to other people later/eventually)

Yeah, the main point of the comic is to create a story without plotting ahead. It'd force the writers/artists to take cues from another and think of creative ways to continue from where the previous left off. Right now, this thread is to set some ground rules- but once the comic starts, we'll be recording any world-building done on-page and keep a log of the story to make it easier for the different writers/artists to keep track of. This should help everyone keep track of things since with so many different ideas/people working on the story, it'll get difficult to do so. Heck, I sometimes lose track of things I've done for PRS.

Sorry if there was/is any confusion on this. I do want to leave as much of the official story stuff to when the artists get started. Creating things like what the enemy Pokemon are in dungeons would limit the artists/writers when it came to their story ideas. If/when an artist determines the nature of enemy Pokemon in dungeons (or the lack of), then it gets added to official worldbuilding. Then the world-builders can analyze what the newest revelation means and set any rules if needed- or add in ideas to further build on what was on page. Just know that nothing of this nature can be finalized unless shown on page.

Right now, we're just trying to set some ground rules that may pose a problem in the narrative later on- like using reviver seeds to revive the dead- or overplaying the fire/water weakness. These elements aren't necessarily adding to any of the story. Just prevent reviver seeds from being a get-out-of-death free card. Saying what causes dungeon pokemon to be hostile WOULD be adding to the story and would push writers/artists to use it as part of the plot- we don't want any of the things we set now to direct the story in a major way. Yes, you can argue that reviver seeds being unable to bring back the death will impact the story, but not in the same was as saying dungeon enemies are rabid or possessed.

[Scytherwolf]

I didn't know the dungeon enemies thing was a story thing. Just ignore that part then.

[Neo Emolga]

Guess I'll drop my thoughts here.

Fire Pokémon and Water

I'm okay with fire Pokémon swimming in water, but they really don't like it. Kind of like how people would feel if they had to swim while fully clothed. It shouldn't be painful, but it shouldn't be pleasant to them either and perhaps make them feel very light-headed instead. Otherwise, attacks like Water Gun and other early water type attacks wouldn't do anything.

Excessive exposure to water should make them too light-headed and that's what causes them to faint. But if they only swim for a few seconds and quickly dry themselves off with their own fire attacks once they're out of the water, they should be okay. But yeah, it would make sense for a fire Pokémon to be hesitant about going into water and look for alternatives, only jumping into the drink if there's absolutely no other way around or if there's just no time to look for other options.

Reviver Seeds

I see Reviver Seeds kind of working the same way Phoenix Down works in Final Fantasy games. It may revive, but when it does, your character has next to nothing for health and is in critical condition. If you dare try using it in the middle of a battle, chances are very good they're just going to get knocked out again.

This is how I think things should work out with Reviver Seeds:

• They sometimes work, and only if the Pokémon's body is in relatively intact condition (such as if they were suffocated, drowned, severely beaten, fell from a great height, etc). If the Pokémon got completely incinerated, decapitated, crushed, or died some other kind of grizzly death, it's all over. The more bodily harm that's been done, the less of a chance it has of working.
• They aren't instant (I feel like all berries and healing items should take a bit of time to work also). They're kind of like a defibrillator and sometimes it may take a while for the Pokémon to revive.
• They should be rare and expensive (much more than the games).
• If they revive, the Pokémon is still in bad shape and needs additional healing and recovery.

How many moves?

As many as they want, BUT I would like to see it where a Pokémon may learn a move, but sometimes they still need to learn how to use it well. Maybe they have trouble aiming it, maybe it starts off weak and they need someone to help train them to make it more powerful and unlock its fullest potential, or maybe they can't use it quickly enough just from lack of experience. But otherwise, I'm not against them learning whatever they can, but perhaps a move a Pokémon hasn't used in a long time might be something they've forgotten how to use well.

Carnivores?

Yes. I'm okay with them still eating berries for healing, but let's face it, some Pokémon weren't given all kinds of sharp incisors just so they could eat apples. :P

About humans?

I like the idea that humans are kind of like myths and folklore and would cause the same kind of reaction to Pokémon of this world as if you said to people mermaids or centaurs exist in our world. The Pokémon may know what they are from the myths the same way we know what mermaids and centaurs are like, but they don't consider them to be real.

Explorer Badges

I'm okay with the teleportation features, BUT... give it a recharge time, make it have to use some kind of fuel or energy source, and make it have a charge-up delay from activation to actually working. That way, it can't be used as an instant escape and it can only be used once the coast is clear.