History VideoGame / PokemonMasters

* NotMeThisTime: Of a sort -- [[spoiler:Rainbow Rocket Giovanni]] is accused of his counterpart's deeds, which, given what kind of person they are, they've most likely committed those deeds in their own region. [[spoiler:Rainbow Rocket Giovanni]] notes that they have him confused for their Giovanni, but runs with it, anyway.

* AnachronicOrder: For the Villain Arc of the main story, the chapters for each region are listed in the order they originally came out. However, after Kanto, the story jumps to the Sinnoh chapter before backtracking to the two preceding regions.

* TheAce: Red is heavily implied to be this for the entire Pokémon Masters League. Lear, the founder of the tournament, was shown to be able to fight on par with Iris, who is stated to already be Unova's Champion (and thus strong enough to defeat Alder). Despite this strength, Lear regularly vents about how frustrated he is to have lost to Red, implying that Red's strength surpasses that of a typical Champion. This is in line with his strength in the main series; as of ''Pokemon Sun and Moon'', he is one of only two trainers with a title implied to be beyond that of "Champion" -- namely, "Battle Legend" -- a title that he shares with Blue.

** The Poke War Games event also has this with Golden Spheres that are rewarded for completing each of the featured character's Battle Prep events.

* TheAce: Red is heavily implied to be this for the entire Pokemon Masters League. Lear, the founder of the tournament, was shown to be able to fight on par with Iris, who is stated to already be Unova's Champion (and thus strong enough to defeat Alder). Despite this strength, Lear regularly vents about how frustrated he is to have lost to Red, implying that Red's strength surpasses that of a typical Champion. This is in line with his strength in the main series; as of ''Pokemon Sun and Moon'', he is one of only two trainers with a title implied to be beyond that of "Champion" -- namely, "Battle Legend" -- a title that he shares with Blue.

** [[DownplayedTrope Downplayed]] with Red's Sygna Suit, which is based predominantly on his original outfit but features Mega Charizard X's flames on his jeans and hat pin. His Thunderbolt Sygna Suit has straps that are reminisce of Pikachu's G-Max Move, while his Neo-Champion outfit has a pin that resembles Articuno's head and the inside of his cloak shares the same color of the Freeze Pokemon.

** Hatching a Shiny Pokemon will guarantee it has three skills.

* ArbitraryHeadcountLimit: Each team can only be composed of up to three sync pairs. This is also enforced InUniverse regarding the rules of Sync Battles. While a trainer is permitted to own several Pokemon, they are not allowed to use more than one during a battle except in special circumstances such as when Lear pits the Player and Ash against each other in a traditional 6-vs-6 battle from the mainline series.

** In the Kanto chapter of the Villain arc, many trainers on Pasio -- especially those from Kanto end up in a panic when it's discovered that Red confronted Giovanni when it looked like he was about to initiate a Team Rocket-wide mission, and has been missing for 3 days. Lance and Blue in particular aren't sure what to think, since Red is even stronger than them, but the fact Team Rocket is still causing havoc and he's now no where to be found implies something happened to him. It later turns out Red actually immediately wiped out HALF of the entirety of Team Rocket with just his Snorlax, then went into hiding for 3 days so Snorlax could recover. The fact Giovanni is surprised his Snorlax can Gigantamax also suggests he did this without Snorlax using the transformation. This still counts as Red being out of commission, though only because of how many trainers he had to take on and his limited Pokemon on hand (seemingly only Snorlax, and at most also Charizard).

* BruiserWithASoftCenter: While the Punk trainer sprites can come across as intimidating, a lot of them are very friendly towards you and others during interactions. The Punk Trainer in the Pokemon in Particular tends to say the best type of Pokemon are the Adorable Type.

** Team Break members are almost all uniformly egotistical assholes dead-set on robbing you of your Pokemon and insulting you the entire way through.

** One Collector at the Pokémon Center gripes about his failed attempts to catch Legendary Pokemon, since someone already beats him to the punch in every region. He wonders if it's the same person who's been catching them all, which may be true regarding the player.

** Glacia's Glalie does ''extremely'' pitiful damage, even to Pokémon that are weak to Ice-types, and ''even with'' her sync Move, which upgrades Glalie into Mega Glalie. It takes a ''lot'' of Training Manuals and level uncaps to make them do ''real'' damage, and even then, her role is still more about spamming basic attacks to repeadtly heal herself until a sync move is ready.

* NothingIsTheSameAnymore: Due to the presence of Eternatus bringing Dynamax energy to Pasio, it became possible for certain Pokemon to Dynamax.

** Even compared to most other Strike-category sync pairs, Roark stands out as being ''all'' offense. With his attack buffs and his final skill giving him perfect accuracy on his next attack along with refilling the move gauge, his Cranidos/Rampardos can easily Head Smash things into oblivion, but Head Smash also retains its [[CastFromHitPoints hideous recoil damage]] which will inevitably shave off half of Cranidos's health bar or more on each hit.

* KarmicThief: Subverted and deconstructed during the "Solve the Case (Pt.2)" event. The [[spoiler:impostor]] Phantom Imaginate exclusively targets members of villainous teams, partly in the belief that their partner Pokémon must have been stolen in the first place and unloved by them, but mostly out of a self-serving desire to be praised for "rescuing" the Pokémon. In reality, the victims had all long since gone straight (one, a Team Flare member, ''isn't even in uniform'' when her Pokémon is stolen), their Pokémon were all caught legitimately and genuinely cared for by them, and the heroes are [[DisappointedByTheMotive genuinely outraged by how selfish their true motive is]]. [[spoiler:Played straight, however, by the ''real'' Phantom Imaginate, who accepts a requests from one of the victims to steal their Pokémon back from the impostor.]]

** Some of the story events give away major plot elements from whatever mainline game the event's central character hailed from, such as [[spoiler:Cyrus getting dragged into the Distortion World by Giratina]] at the end of ''Platinum'', or [[spoiler:Lusamine]] being the true BigBad of ''Sun and Moon''. The menu icon for the Villain Arcs also features silhouettes of the main participating villains, one of which is [[spoiler:Chairman Rose, who wouldn't be released until July 2023]].

[[quoteright:350:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/pokemon_masters_title_screen.png]]

* AprilFoolsDay: On April Fools Day 2020, all music in the game's menus was replaced by 8-bit music from ''Red and Blue''. April Fools Day 2021 had the PML center being taken over by Team Break. April Fools Day 2022 had a bunch of Dittos copy the trainers. April Fools Day 2023 saw Lear order an event where the only move that could be used was Metronome.

* ''Villain Arc:'' Later, after the conclusion of the PML, the story shifts away from the player character as everyone faces a new threat: Team Rocket's leader Giovanni schemes to take over Pasio but having crashing against their rival organization Team Plasma who also want to take over Pasio. Later, Team Flare's leader Lysandre has capture two Team Rocket grunts and knew that Giovanni has manipulating every evil faction leader and their subordinates to further his own agenda. In the meantime, Paulo, a rival to the player character, [[CantCatchUp faces his shortcomings as a trainer]] and quietly ponders how to become stronger, [[HeelFaceRevolvingDoor even if it means taking unconventional methods to do so]] seeing the villains showcasing their ill-gotten powers.

* ''Villain Arc:'' Later, after the conclusion of the PML, the story shifts away from the player character as everyone faces a new threat: Team Rocket's leader Giovanni schemes to take over Pasio by manipulating every evil faction leader and their subordinates to further his own agenda. In the meantime, Paulo, a rival to the player character, [[CantCatchUp faces his shortcomings as a trainer]] and quietly ponders how to become stronger, [[HeelFaceRevolvingDoor even if it means taking unconventional methods to do so]] seeing the villains showcasing their ill-gotten powers.

* ''Mysterious Stones Chapter:'' Prof. Bellis comes to learn from [[VideoGame/PokemonLegendsArceus Rei]] about Mysterious Stones that have the same properties as Sync Stones but don't act quite like they do. As the mysteries of these stones are being investigated, Rei senses that someone from his past is quietly spying on their moves...

* NewWorkRecycledGraphics: Pokémon models and animations are once again reused from the [=3DS=] titles. The trainer models are all built from scratch, each with their own different heights (something usually avoided in mainline games) and extremely detailed animations and expressions.
* NintendoHard: Getting all the badges in the game requires beating all Legendary Arena opponents on Level 2 using 5 or less teams and Level 3 using 4 or less, as well as beating most of the Battle Villa with no deaths and all of it with no recoveries. These feats are all but impossible without the best luck in the omniverse helping you out.

* ThePowerOfFriendship: The main method to use Sync Stones properly is if trainer and Pokémon share a special bond with each other.
** This becomes deconstructed when it's discussed how people like Giovanni can use the special power of the stone if he's a ruthless man not into friendship. Colress explains that Sync Stones commonly react to bonds, except the bonds don't necessarily have to be positive for them to work, because as long as trainer and Pokémon come to a mutual agreement of ''any'' kind, they don't need a bond made out of friendship. [[PlotTwist This only puts into question the entire rationale of friendship evolutions from other games having been on good terms at all.]]

** A very notable one is Ash, who is stated to be a [[spoiler:member of the Masters 8.]] It should be noted that most of the anime's dubs had not reached this point yet when the event took place.

* PowerCreep: Downplayed. While new sync pairs don't necessarily have higher stats than old ones, they ''do'' tend to have much more useful and elaborate Skills and Trainer Moves, as well as lots of bells and whistles that older sync pairs don't have, such as Master Skills, Buddy Moves, Max Moves, and EX Roles.

* SecretTestOfCharacter: "Mechanized - Love and Solitude" has [[spoiler:Lusamine arrange a fake emergency at the fancy party she was holding by having two guests pretend to be Team Break members who hold a third guest (a Lady for male players or a Gentleman for female players) hostage, with Gladion proving to be an excellent partner for Magearna, who apparently wasn't lost in a mixup and was intended for Gladion from the start.]]

** Like in the base game, it is implied that Rei and Akari are alternate versions of Lucas and Dawn, and Rei even more so, as he's canonically the one who was dragged in from the modern day to HIsui.

** [[DownplayedTrope Downplayed]] with Red's Sygna Suit, which is based predominantly on his original outfit but features Mega Charizard X's flames on his jeans and hat pin.
** Cynthia's features motifs of Kommo-o's scales in her jacket, pants, shoes, ribbons, and ring as well as Kommo-o's colors throughout. Her Renegade Sygna Suit, on the other hand, has Giratina's color palette and a similar headcrest.
** Blue's entails Blastoise's cannons and shell patterned onto his jacket, pockets that resemble the openings of Blastoise's shell, and Blastoise's shades of blue and cream.

** Serena and Dawn have such motifs featured in their Valentine's Day outfits and Sygna Suits:
*** In the case of the former, Serena's purse, hairtie, and the neck ruffle of her sweater are all reminiscent of the cotton on Whimsicott. Meanwhile, Dawn's hair clips and the brooches on her socks are similar to the strawberries on Alcremie and her apron appears to be directly based on Alcremie's body, as well as the chef design as a whole being based on Alcremie (according to the ''Sword and Shield'' Pokédex) being commonly used as helpers in cookery to make cream for dishes.
*** Serena's Sygna Suit utilizes 50% Forme Zygarde's color palette and patterning, while her EX style is even based on Shiny Zygarde.
*** Dawn's Sygna Suit includes a hat with a ribbon reminiscent of Cresselia's wings, as well as a gemstone that resembles the purple growth on Cresselia's head. It also invokes FairytaleMotifs of a prince, especially that of the one from Sleeping Beauty.

** The Summer outfits of both Gloria and Marnie use the color palettes of Inteleon and Grimmsnarl, respectively.

* SecretTestOfCharacter: "Mechanized - Love and Solitude" has [[spoiler:Lusamine arrange a fake emergency at the fancy party she was holding by having two guests pretend to be Team Break members who hold a third guest hostage, with Gladion proving to be an excellent partner for Magearna, who apparently wasn't lost in a mixup and was intended for Gladion from the start.]]

** A scene from the Trials on the Isle event references how the player character in ''Sun/Moon'' would constantly have [[DissonantSerenity an unchanging smile]] even in unfitting situations. [[https://twitter.com/ZachB64/status/1383122969015115776 The scene]] suggests that Elio and Selene make these faces while deeply lost in thought.