So some people read fanfiction as a way to continue a series, book, or movie that they love. Those who don't may have many and varied reasons! I am interested in these reasons.

ALSO

For those of you who read [fanfiction], I am writing a small script/program to sort fanfiction.net stories by the number of reviews they have, thus making it easy to find stories that are actually good ^_^.

If you would like to request a database/list of stories from a particular fandom, please post here! Also please specify the file type you want (text file, word document, excel document etc.).

New Rules for Battles

None of this is official, it's just a fun idea. Enjoy!

Pokemon battles in the games are quite different from those in the anime. The most notable difference is the lack of a "Dodge" command; a "Wait" command, telling a pokemon to wait and see what the opponent will do; and "Counterattack", the ability for attacks to be used against other attacks. You often hear a trainer telling his pokemon to "Dodge and use Thundershock", and you often see one beam type attack being fired at another and meeting each other, or a razor wind blowing away smog or razor leaves, with one of the attacks beating the other, and damaging one or both of the pokemon accordingly.

This idea would add different rulesets for battles, including:

Classic Rules

• Rules are the same as the official games.
• Default "Shift" battle type. i.e. Pokemon may be switched at any time.
• "Classic Rules: No Shifting" subtype for the "Set" battle option in the original games. i.e. Pokemon only switch after fainting.

Best of # (e.g. Best of 3.)

• Each trainer sends out a Pokemon, but when one faints, both are recalled and two new Pokemon fight for "Round 2".
• Trainer Battles only.

Advanced Rules

• This includes the four new Actions below: Dodge, Dodge and Attack, Counterattack, and Wait.
• Designed to allow the player to have a battle much more similar to the anime battles.
• "Advanced Rules: No Waiting" for disallowing Waiting and Counterattacks.

Advanced Rules

tl;dr: Skip to the Example Battle below.

Dodge:

• 50-75% success depending on difference in speed: success = (0.6+0.5(a.speed-f.speed)/a.speed), capped 50-75%

Dodge and attack:

• Dodge has 30-55% success, offensive attacks only - status effects 30% less accurate, damage at 50%
• Using a move with "Dodge" as its Form during a "Dodge and attack" means the Dodge doesn't have a success penalty (stays 50-75%)

Counterattack:

• Nondamaging Counterattack drops effects and randomly lowers opponent's damage to 0-75%, status effects 50% less accurate
• Damaging Counterattack causes both attacks to do 0-100% damage (total adding to 100%), status effects 50% less accurate
• Type advantage adds 25% to attacker's damage and removes 25% from foe's damage
• Level difference adds per level 5% to higher Pokemon's damage and removes 5% from lower Pokemon's damage (max 25%)
• Each attack may have one or two "Forms" which are the sort of attack it is (Punch, Beam, Wind etc.)
• A move can Counterattack a foe's attack with favourable Form or Type matchup (for moves allowed to Type Counterattack)

Here is an Excel table of the various Forms used:
http://www.megaupload.com/?d=BRBCSMHP

Wait:

• You attempt to wait for your opponent to move first "[Pokemon] waits for its moment..."
• If both Pokemon wait on one turn, the next turn neither are allowed to choose Wait. "[Pokemon] and [Foe] are staring it out!"

• Dodge and Counterattack are only available after the opponent chooses to to use a regular attack.
• When the opponent chooses a regular attack, chat reads as "[Foe] readies [Attack]!" / "What will [Pokemon] do?"
• The Pokemon readying its attack will always move first, but the damage from an attack + counterattack is applied to both pokemon at once.
• Low level wild Pokemon don't know how to Counterattack and don't Wait because they don't know why waiting can be an advantage.
• Edit: Increased priority moves like Quick Attack will hit the foe and end the turn if it tries waiting, as they are fast.

Ranges could be continuous or discrete.
Discrete examples:   

• Non-damaging counterattack reduces damage to 0%, 25%, 50% or 75%.
• Damaging counterattack reduces damage and status accuracy by (foe, attacker) 0%,100% ; 25%,75% ; 50%,50% ; 75%,25% ; 100%,0%.

Example Battle: Advanced Rules

Pikachu Vs. Charmander, Pikachu is faster. Note that this battle has a lot of dodging, to show different cases.

[Turn 1]
[What will Pikachu do?] >Wait
Pikachu waits for its moment...
Charmander readies Ember...
[What will Pikachu do?] >Dodge and use Thundershock.
Charmander uses Ember!
Pikachu fails to dodge and takes 20 points of damage.	Pikachu takes normal damage from Ember.
Pikachu uses Thundershock!
Charmander takes 10 points of damage.	Charmander takes 50% damage from Thundershock, chance of paralyze was halved (5%).
[Turn 2]
[What will Pikachu do?] >Wait
Pikachu waits for its moment...
Charmander readies Flamethrower...
[What will Pikachu do?] >Counterattack with Thunderbolt.	Pikachu is able to Counterattack without a type advantage because both attacks have Beam Form and a Beam can counter another Beam.
Charmander uses Flamethrower!
Pikachu Counterattacks with Thunderbolt!
Pikachu takes 10 points of damage.	Counterattack worked out at Pikachu receiving 25% damage from Flamethrower and Charmander receiving 75% damage from Thunderbolt. Paralyze and burn acc. was halved.
Charmander takes 30 points of damage.
[Turn 3]
[What will Pikachu do?] >Wait
Pikachu and Foe's Charmander are staring it out!	Both Pokemon chose to Wait. Next turn, Wait is disabled.
[Turn 4]
[What will Pikachu do?] >Thunderbolt
Pikachu readies Thunderbolt...
Pikachu uses Thunderbolt but Charmander dodges with Dig!	The slower Pokemon can not Counterattack without using Wait to see what the opponent is going to do. But it can Dodge or Dodge and Attack.
[Turn 5]
[What will Pikachu do?] >Wait	Pikachu Waits for Charmander to appear and use Dig.
Charmander readies Dig!
[What will Pikachu do?] >Dodge with Quick Attack.	Quick Attack has "Dodge" as its Form, so Dodge has the same success as without an attack (50-75% instead of 30-55%). Earlier, Dig also has Dodge as its form. Dodge Form attacks appear as "Dodges with [Attack]", not "Dodges and uses [Attack].
Charmander uses Dig!
Pikachu dodges with Quick Attack!
Charmander takes 4 points of damage.	Quick Attack's damage is still cut in half when used with Dodge.
[Turn 6]
[What will Pikachu do?] >Dodge	Pikachu will try to dodge whatever move Charmander uses.
Charmander uses Flamethrower!
Pikachu fails to dodge and takes 40 points of damage.
[Turn 7]
[What will Pikachu do?] >Wait
Charmander gets ready to dodge, but Pikachu isn't moving!	Charmander used Dodge but Pikachu used Wait. Wait and Dodge are disabled next turn.
[Turn 8]
[What will Pikachu do?] >Quick Attack
Charmander waits for a moment but Pikachu strikes fast with Quick Attack!	Charmander tried to wait but was attacked with an increased priority (fast) move. The turn ends. This is a means of countering people who always wait to counter your moves.
Charmander takes 8 points of damage.
[Turn 9]
[What will Pikachu do?] >Thunderbolt
Pikachu uses Thunderbolt!	Charmander was not able to Dodge or Wait to Counterattack.
It's a critical hit! Charmander takes 80 points of damage.
Charmander is unable to battle!	A trainer's Pokemon "is unable to battle" at 0hp, a wild pokemon "faints".
Pikachu gains 451 XP.

[/list][/list]

Berries are really underused, and none of them have game breaking effects. So: why not make a dedicated hold item slot just for berries?

Here's a list of berry effects in case you want to think about strategies or issues:

1	Cheri Berry	Cures Paralysis
2	Chesto Berry	Cures Sleep
3	Pecha Berry	Cures Poison
4	Rawst Berry	Cures Burn
5	Aspear Berry	Cures Freeze
6	Leppa Berry	Restores 10 PP
7	Oran Berry	Restores 10 HP
8	Persim Berry	Cures Confusion
9	Lum Berry	Cures any status ailment
10	Sitrus Berry	Restores 25% HP
11	Figy Berry	Restores 12.5% HP, confuses Pokémon that dislike spicy food
12	Wiki Berry	Restores 12.5% HP, confuses Pokémon that dislike dry food
13	Mago Berry	Restores 12.5% HP, confuses Pokémon that dislike sweet food
14	Aguav Berry	Restores 12.5% HP, confuses Pokémon that dislike bitter food
15	Iapapa Berry	Restores 12.5% HP, confuses Pokémon that dislike sour food
36	Occa Berry	Weakens foe's super effective Fire-type move
37	Passho Berry	Weakens foe's super effective Water-type move
38	Wacan Berry	Weakens foe's super effective Electric-type move
39	Rindo Berry	Weakens foe's super effective Grass-type move
40	Yache Berry	Weakens foe's super effective Ice-type move
41	Chople Berry	Weakens foe's super effective Fighting-type move
42	Kebia Berry	Weakens foe's super effective Poison-type move
43	Shuca Berry	Weakens foe's super effective Ground-type move
44	Coba Berry	Weakens foe's super effective Flying-type move
45	Payapa Berry	Weakens foe's super effective Psychic-type move
46	Tanga Berry	Weakens foe's super effective Bug-type move
47	Charti Berry	Weakens foe's super effective Rock-type move
48	Kasib Berry	Weakens foe's super effective Ghost-type move
49	Haban Berry	Weakens foe's super effective Dragon-type move
50	Colbur Berry	Weakens foe's super effective Dark-type move
51	Babiri Berry	Weakens foe's super effective Steel-type move
52	Chilan Berry	Weakens foe's Normal-type move
53	Liechi Berry	Raises Attack when HP falls below 33%
54	Ganlon Berry	Raises Defense when HP falls below 33%
55	Salac Berry	Raises Speed when HP falls below 33%
56	Petaya Berry	Raises Special Attack when HP falls below 33%
57	Apicot Berry	Raises Special Defense when HP falls below 33%
58	Lansat Berry	Raises critical hit ratio when HP falls below 33%
59	Starf Berry	Raises a random stat when HP falls below 33%
60	Enigma Berry	Restores holder's HP if hit by a super effective move
61	Micle Berry	Raises the accuracy of one move when HP falls below 33%
62	Custap Berry	Causes the holder to go first once when HP falls below 33%
63	Jaboca Berry	Causes recoil on foe if holder is hit by a physical move
64	Rowap Berry	Causes recoil on foe if holder is hit by a special move

So PU will be an open world game. You will be able to take your level 5 charmander and walk for 2 hours along various roads until you reach The Plains of Death, and if you so choose, you will be able to encounter level 50 pokemon, and you will be owned for your trouble. All this is well and good (if you wander that far, you kinda deserve what's coming to you).

However.

I think there should be certain (small) islands, caves, hidden valleys etc. which must be unlocked or inaccessible in some way to players who either aren't the right level or haven't completed some kind of quest. Having everything open from day 1 takes away from the feeling of progress and prestige. The reason you can get away with almost full open world roaming in 3D mmos is because the monsters will literally see you and kill you before you can get very far into areas that are too high a level for you. Perhaps if we have large patches of grass which a player must cross, this would simulate such a situation (repels don't work if you haven't got a high level pokemon, as in the official games). This would be in addition to special unlockable areas.

I also think there should be some kind of warning when you walk into or near (maybe within 2 tiles) of a patch of grass which contains pokemon higher than 10 levels above your highest pokemon. Something like "You feel a little uneasy..." in the chat window, visible only to yourself. Then when the pokemon are more than 15 levels above, "You feel a strong urge to turn back...". For 20 levels+, "You feel a sense of immediate danger, as if something terrible might happen at any moment...".

Please DON'T reply here. This is a notification that there is a topic of the same title in the announcements board, see link:

http://pokemon-universe.com/index.php/topic,437.0.html

Posting this because it has come to my attention that some of you don't read the announcements board.

Should we include a function so that you can /check someone out when you see them? This would display a small window with info about them.

Types of things displayable:

• Player name and level
• NPC Gym badges earned (and whether or not they were repeated on hard mode
• Clothes and equipment they are wearing
• Optional by player - Pokemon currently in party
• Number of pokemon seen/owned
• Highest level of pokemon owned
• Tournament standings, such as tournament points (if points are awarded for placing), or the top one or few placings achieved
• Home town / affiliation - this is not necessarily set at the start of the game, afterall you can move house or change your nationality
• Items in inventory that are for sale (possibly with the ability to buy automatically)
• Custom short "/check message" written by player
• etc.

Probably a good idea to add the ability to go /anon, which would hide everything except your name and what clothes you are wearing.

What kind of system would you use to make each pokemon more unique, even when it is the same species as someone else's?

Firstly... NO equipping pokemon with gear. This includes calling it something else, like "multiple hold items" or "pokeball enhancements".

As far as I see it, the closest you will get to "equipping" your pokemon will be hold items, and the permanent boosts to normal stats via the system replacing EVs. There will likely be many quests to help you gain points on normal stats for individual pokemon.

My (totally unofficial) idea would be the ability to add special stat boosts like critical hit, accuracy and evasion, or more unique bonuses like +1 turns on weather. These would be permanent once applied and would come from quests/items found in the field/dropped off pokemon/treasure chests. Each boost would be relatively small, and worth a number of points, and there would be a cap on points like with EVs, this cap could be shared with the EV-replacing system cap. If I was feeling exceptionally generous, I may even make it possible to reset a pokemon to its base stats and "re-train".

Post your ascii art here ^^

Credit to Aindreas23 for the idea Hope he doesn't mind me posting the topic.

Either use the font "Courier" (this is the best monospaced font available on these boards) or if you use a different font not available here, attach a link or a picture. You can of course use any font, but without a monospaced one (so that every character is the same width) it may display wrongly on the forums.

To set the font as Courier, highlight the art and use the "Font Face" drop-down menu when making your message, or use the tags [#font=courier]Your Text Here[/font] without the #

It's generally best to use as few lines as possible, and to stick to a specific character set. E.g. the normal ascii set (those you can make with a keyboard), or the Japanese character set, or the extended ascii symbols, unicode etc.

My contribution:

     /,|          ,-‘`>
  .-‘//        ,-‘_--<.__
.’_”l_’\/\ _.-‘/’_.---__/
|\ ==/  | |_/||\.-,,
 ``-\./’ /  ``’__.-‘
    |__/’-. -‘’  \ _
     `-.__/.--\__.` \
           \\/    `\\`


It's Buizel! Done in basic ASCII. I hope it's not too hard to see :/

Have fun! I'd love to see some art.