Review: Pokemon Tabletop United
Posted: Wed Nov 13, 2019 5:33 am
Hello there. Let me tell you about this game I like. It has a lot of problems that I've come to realize over the years, and ever since I started lurking here some more issues came to light.
A while back, someone did a rageview of Pokemon Tabletop Adventures, a game that I have not played. To be honest, I can't even remember if I've ever looked at the rules for those. However, with the new Pokemon games coming out, PTA is actually getting a third edition, courtesy of lone wolf "Dr. Mr. Stark". It looks fucking awful and I'm still never playing it, so we aren't talking about any of that shit.
Let's talk about Pokemon Tabletop United. It's only been brought up around here once or twice, but what's been said about it?
One thing out of the way first: Just because I like this game does not mean I will hesitate to shit on it. I wholeheartedly encourage you to do the same. I'll be upfront and admit that I'd like to take a bunch of the stuff from this game and refine it into a new game, like how PTU was to PTA, so I have ulterior motives with this review. I really think that a lot of the fat could be trimmed from this game, but the PTU devs have stopped working on PTU in favor of a new game - they made so many changes that it wasn't really PTU anymore. That's fine and basically what I intend to do, but the progress on the new game is fucking glacial and it goes in a different direction in some areas than I might prefer. I really want to scale up from kids going on their first adventure to your standard heroic fantasy shenanigans. The more you tear into it, the better.
I'll be taking things one chapter at a time. All I have to drink tonight is some mint creme de menthe and I only put that shit in coffee, so I'll just be getting properly blasted like this guy probably is:
![Image](https://i.imgur.com/94ACbDV.png)
Sure, they look like cigarettes, but that little guy looks stoned out of its mind or very depressed. This guy isn't in this book.
This is a free game since nobody wants to get sued by Nintendo, so if you want to read along you can go grab yourself a copy.
That being said, this game is over four years old. There has been errata. The developers stopped working on the game, so plenty of people have been tweaking things on their own to smooth the game out. I'll be bringing these "fixes" up when it's relevant, because there is some really stupid shit in here. I may also at any point start rambling about a mechanic I think is especially workable or shitty. I haven't even READ the chapter on Pokemon Contests since I picked the game up, because those are so horrible that nobody even pretends to use them. That'll be a fun chapter. Anyway, let's get this show started.
![Image](https://i.imgur.com/1NL2oZw.png)
It's a good thing this book isn't sold in stores, because almost nobody would ever open this up if it didn't have Pokemon in the title.
![Image](https://i.imgur.com/XJR8KaZ.png)
All of the art in this book is just taken from around the internet. Can't say I blame them, nobody's gonna pay an artist to make stuff for this. Fortunately there's a huge variety of fanart out there.
This is the part where you convince people to play your game, so how good of a job do they do?
Recommended number of players: 2-4. This is accurate, you do NOT want to play this game with a lot of people. My cognitive load can handle combats of up to 20 people/pokemon at a time, and 5 players eat up half that, unless you're playing a "league campaign" (I don't). The intention of the game is to handle a wide variety of Pokemon games outside of your typical "get 8 badges and become the champ" setup, and that's what it delivers on. They even recommend trying out a trainer who takes a more... active role in combat. That's pretty much the only kind of game I play. They also strive to make PTU's pokemon more balanced than the video games, and this is absolutely true... but anyone who's played Pokemon can tell you that shit is 12 sorts of fucked up and Gamefreak never had any intention of balancing shit. So really, the bar was low.
You need the usual dice and... the Pokemon PDF (all 750 pages of it). It also says it isn't necessary to play with a grid, but I've played in those games and... no thank you. There's a short blurb stating the differences between PTU and PTA: Most of the changes are the inspiration for the name of the game: Unlike in PTA, Trainers and Pokemon in PTU actually operate off the same basic chassis. Everybody has the same combat stats, the same skills, can learn moves, abilities, what the fuck ever. I could not imagine how horrific PTA must have been, but the rageview gave me a good idea.
There's also mention of some splat books: three of them. One is for making Legendary Pokemon more impressive and divine, one is for sci-fi, and the other is for fantasy. Those will have to wait for another day. Maybe.
We end this section with the most important question: What is Pokemon?
I wish Gamefreak would ask themselves that before they go cutting their roster and move list in new games... but I digress. I gave up on the video games when the 3DS came out and subsequent releases have only made me feel more secure in that decision. To be honest, I don't like Pokemon that much. I like pokemon, but I don't like Pokemon, you know? The setting seems like a great place to live, but I tried running a game in it and it was just too incoherent for me to continue. I also didn't want to make up my own setting that was just a new region in the Pokemon world. I don't care for how well-off everybody is and, to be frank, it's made for kids. Nothing that bad ever really happens in the Pokemon universe, not on screen. But I'm just rambling at this point, what does the fucking book say?
They explain what Pokemon are as if you didn't know what they are: they're monsters, they have Types, they Evolve, etc. People catch them. These people are called POKEMON TRAINERS and they battle them for sport. I like this upcoming quote:
And that's really it for the introduction. I've gotta say, they had me hooked early and then lost me when they started going on about the fundamental Pokemon shit. I'm here to watch a group of heroes get attacked by a pack of Poochyena in the night only for them to smack them around, throw one in a well, and roast the rest. Literally. Then eat their sweet, sweet wolf meat.
Jesus, not like that, this game doesn't have a BoEF supplement.
Next up: Character Creation.
What the fuck do you mean it's 20 pages long?! This book is 500? Oh, fuck me. Good thing a quarter of that is Abilities and Moves...
A while back, someone did a rageview of Pokemon Tabletop Adventures, a game that I have not played. To be honest, I can't even remember if I've ever looked at the rules for those. However, with the new Pokemon games coming out, PTA is actually getting a third edition, courtesy of lone wolf "Dr. Mr. Stark". It looks fucking awful and I'm still never playing it, so we aren't talking about any of that shit.
Let's talk about Pokemon Tabletop United. It's only been brought up around here once or twice, but what's been said about it?
I haven't played PTA, but I would consider the transition more like that of early D&D to AD&D. An improvement over the primordial morass that came before, but still riddled with issues and an overreliance on adhering to the video games... well, D&D didn't have that problem.Koumei quoting some retard wrote:"PTU is the Pathfinder of PTA"
This is probably more accurate than the previous quote.Shrapnel wrote:I will say, as someone who is almost totally ignorant of TTRPGs, that I've found PTU easier to use than PTA, and much more accessible.
This one's the most accurate.Grek wrote:They're both a fucking mess.
Pokemon Tabletop United
One thing out of the way first: Just because I like this game does not mean I will hesitate to shit on it. I wholeheartedly encourage you to do the same. I'll be upfront and admit that I'd like to take a bunch of the stuff from this game and refine it into a new game, like how PTU was to PTA, so I have ulterior motives with this review. I really think that a lot of the fat could be trimmed from this game, but the PTU devs have stopped working on PTU in favor of a new game - they made so many changes that it wasn't really PTU anymore. That's fine and basically what I intend to do, but the progress on the new game is fucking glacial and it goes in a different direction in some areas than I might prefer. I really want to scale up from kids going on their first adventure to your standard heroic fantasy shenanigans. The more you tear into it, the better.
I'll be taking things one chapter at a time. All I have to drink tonight is some mint creme de menthe and I only put that shit in coffee, so I'll just be getting properly blasted like this guy probably is:
![Image](https://i.imgur.com/94ACbDV.png)
Sure, they look like cigarettes, but that little guy looks stoned out of its mind or very depressed. This guy isn't in this book.
This is a free game since nobody wants to get sued by Nintendo, so if you want to read along you can go grab yourself a copy.
That being said, this game is over four years old. There has been errata. The developers stopped working on the game, so plenty of people have been tweaking things on their own to smooth the game out. I'll be bringing these "fixes" up when it's relevant, because there is some really stupid shit in here. I may also at any point start rambling about a mechanic I think is especially workable or shitty. I haven't even READ the chapter on Pokemon Contests since I picked the game up, because those are so horrible that nobody even pretends to use them. That'll be a fun chapter. Anyway, let's get this show started.
![Image](https://i.imgur.com/1NL2oZw.png)
It's a good thing this book isn't sold in stores, because almost nobody would ever open this up if it didn't have Pokemon in the title.
Chapter 1: Introduction
![Image](https://i.imgur.com/XJR8KaZ.png)
All of the art in this book is just taken from around the internet. Can't say I blame them, nobody's gonna pay an artist to make stuff for this. Fortunately there's a huge variety of fanart out there.
This is the part where you convince people to play your game, so how good of a job do they do?
Recommended number of players: 2-4. This is accurate, you do NOT want to play this game with a lot of people. My cognitive load can handle combats of up to 20 people/pokemon at a time, and 5 players eat up half that, unless you're playing a "league campaign" (I don't). The intention of the game is to handle a wide variety of Pokemon games outside of your typical "get 8 badges and become the champ" setup, and that's what it delivers on. They even recommend trying out a trainer who takes a more... active role in combat. That's pretty much the only kind of game I play. They also strive to make PTU's pokemon more balanced than the video games, and this is absolutely true... but anyone who's played Pokemon can tell you that shit is 12 sorts of fucked up and Gamefreak never had any intention of balancing shit. So really, the bar was low.
You need the usual dice and... the Pokemon PDF (all 750 pages of it). It also says it isn't necessary to play with a grid, but I've played in those games and... no thank you. There's a short blurb stating the differences between PTU and PTA: Most of the changes are the inspiration for the name of the game: Unlike in PTA, Trainers and Pokemon in PTU actually operate off the same basic chassis. Everybody has the same combat stats, the same skills, can learn moves, abilities, what the fuck ever. I could not imagine how horrific PTA must have been, but the rageview gave me a good idea.
There's also mention of some splat books: three of them. One is for making Legendary Pokemon more impressive and divine, one is for sci-fi, and the other is for fantasy. Those will have to wait for another day. Maybe.
We end this section with the most important question: What is Pokemon?
I wish Gamefreak would ask themselves that before they go cutting their roster and move list in new games... but I digress. I gave up on the video games when the 3DS came out and subsequent releases have only made me feel more secure in that decision. To be honest, I don't like Pokemon that much. I like pokemon, but I don't like Pokemon, you know? The setting seems like a great place to live, but I tried running a game in it and it was just too incoherent for me to continue. I also didn't want to make up my own setting that was just a new region in the Pokemon world. I don't care for how well-off everybody is and, to be frank, it's made for kids. Nothing that bad ever really happens in the Pokemon universe, not on screen. But I'm just rambling at this point, what does the fucking book say?
They explain what Pokemon are as if you didn't know what they are: they're monsters, they have Types, they Evolve, etc. People catch them. These people are called POKEMON TRAINERS and they battle them for sport. I like this upcoming quote:
The worst part is that it's true. I don't think the games ever really explain it beyond that. That's one of the biggest problems with the franchise and by extension, PTU. I try my best to answer shit like this so it makes sense in-game, but it's hard when you're confined to the source material. They also mention that some pokemon are used as labor - Electric Types may be used to power generators, people ride pokemon around, stuff like that. I hope you can see the ethical arguments from here, because I'm not touching ethics in Pokemon. I made them fucking monsters that eat people and wreck shit so that's less of an issue. They continue to go on for a bit about the Pokemon setting, and I really don't care to repeat it. There's a League and Badges and Pokemon Centers, Battle Frontiers and evil Criminal Teams. Some people are just fucking magic. You know the drill.Dogfighting Apologist wrote:This might sound horribly similar to underground dog fighting, but that couldn’t be further from the truth in Pokémon. It’s an established principle of the setting in the Pokémon universe that Pokémon almost universally enjoy battling and have evolved to be skillful fighters.
And that's really it for the introduction. I've gotta say, they had me hooked early and then lost me when they started going on about the fundamental Pokemon shit. I'm here to watch a group of heroes get attacked by a pack of Poochyena in the night only for them to smack them around, throw one in a well, and roast the rest. Literally. Then eat their sweet, sweet wolf meat.
Jesus, not like that, this game doesn't have a BoEF supplement.
Next up: Character Creation.
What the fuck do you mean it's 20 pages long?! This book is 500? Oh, fuck me. Good thing a quarter of that is Abilities and Moves...