The Pokédex - Extended Fanon Edition

Possibly. Though Juniper's gift would be a bit unexpected, then. (I guess your Mom expected it, but she acted as though you were surprised... (or was that the Pokédex?))

I still don't see evidence that starter trios are passed out to everyone, though.

It is clear that Nintendium veins exist in the Pokémon world as well, though.

Mom: "I can't believe Prof. Juniper gave you a pokedex! (Beat) Actually, I can. I knew that's what she was going to do."

Or it was something like that. It's been a couple of days since I saw the line.

edited 9th Mar '11 2:36:22 PM by Blissey1

@ Tangent: Wait, otters can't have exponential growth, especially not sea otters. They give birth to single pups 98% of the time, why would-

(*looks at article*)

Oh...

Wait, how does that gel with these guys being uncommon again? 10-12 offspring per breeding cycle is abnormally high, even among more fecund mammals such as rats...

^ They're uncommon because anyone who tries catching them gets Impaled with Extreme Prejudice.

Crazy Dangerous =/= Uncommon (and raises issues about why these guys are being handed out to novice trainers). And having an (borderline-)obligate carnivore (especially one with a metabolism as fast as an otter's) with a rate of reproduction that fast would absolutely wreck an ecosystem.

edited 9th Mar '11 4:18:49 PM by TracerBullet

^ I changed the birth-rates, if you must know. Also you have to take into account that not all of them will live to reproduce.

I could stomach the shells being stones, but why would a Samurott have a bone or driftwood "katana" when their "swords" would be made of their body armor?

^ And how exactly does one go about growing a detachable piece of their body?

^ You grow one that's attached, but easy to break off and eventually regenerates in case if you lose your blade.

Personally, I don't see anything wrong with Samurott fashioning their own blades, but given what they're partially modeled off of, I'm not sure that they would be content with materials as fragile as sharpened driftwood and rib bones.

Well, the bones of a Pokemon (especially a Steel-type) are probably much tougher than human or RL bones.

Are there even creatures in the seas around Unova with rib bones that would be that large? Also, don't bones decay faster in the presence of moisture? Unless if they're doing something to augment the bones, I don't see it panning out in the long run. Also, wouldn't there be a greater variety in blades distributed amongst trainers of captive Samurott than them all being solely steel, you know, like other metals and ceramics?

Perhaps the weapons are part of their body at first, and then detach sometime later in their life?

That's what I was thinking.

So like my post in #3784 then?

What if their blades detach by a process similar to how some RL lizards are capable of severing their own tails? (Scientific term eludes me ATM.)

edited 9th Mar '11 5:58:18 PM by TracerBullet

Guys, guys, you are trying to tie into the "real world" too tightly. This is a world where, and I never get tired of stating it, a ten-year-old human can go on explorations of a cave, find a hole, leap to the next floor below to a ground that is ~10m away, or even leap down some whole floors, and pretty much instantly walk away, unscratched. What a friggin' "mouse", "dragonfly" or "sea lion" would have evolved up like during countless generations to have forced humans to be like this? We are allowed to scale "normal" things up quite a good bit; expected to if we are explicitly comparing things to the real world, I'd say.

Specific bones that grow up to become a detachable part is doable. Then again, growing a partial exoskeleton is even more doable. We do have cases like Scyther where one part of the body does not grow like the others. The stress from detaching a part of their body for the first time, perhaps under instigation from other members of their species, would be an important element in the rite of passage for such Pokémon.

For an (nonexclusive) alternative and if nothing else, the shell could be the remains / former home of a Clamperl that are collected by the adults as a foundation of heirloom or even as a form of currency. It even make sense that individuals of the species wanted to keep a specific "coin" over the others they may have collected. Youth of the species may build skill and confidence by betting and trading such "coins" in battles.

Anyway, makes me think (perhaps I shouldn't have got back to drinking coffee). Giving such Pokémon as Cubone bred in captivity a helmet made of (say) plastic and then letting Trainers have those Pokémon, while it works for the individual, does not scale well because we'd have to state what the League considers a Cubone with a water-resisting plastic helmet entering a tournament to be like, and that's only the simpler case (I'm thinking of Wormadam living near demolition sites for a complicated case right now), not to mention it breaks the semantics of their rituals in the wild (I mean, it's not going to be nice when such a released Cubone decided to leave his Uranium-enriched club at the species's graveyard).

Meh... you guys go with the article. I need to go empty my head.

Hence why Pokemon raised in captivity are not released into the wild, just adopted.

^ Considering the great (implied) divergence in behavior among wild and captive starters in some of the articles that we have, that doesn't sound like it would be that far off. A creature that has lived its entire life expecting to be fed and cared for by a third party is going to have a rough time transitioning to a setting where they must not only provide for themselves, but must be on guard from potential attackers at all times. (Hence why all those 12-year olds running eugenics programs are horrible, horrible people.)

... I wonder what people would do with the eventual backlog of 'mons waiting to be adopted?

Ever wondered where do the Battle Factories and Stadium facilities get their rentals from? Also, gifted Pokemon and such things; Bill, for example, seems to have Eevee to spare.

edited 10th Mar '11 10:06:17 AM by Eriorguez

Wrong thread, ignore.

edited 10th Mar '11 10:08:33 AM by TheGinkei

^x2 That's because Bill is a horrible person with an... Unhealthy interest in Pokemon.

edited 10th Mar '11 10:11:41 AM by TracerBullet

I've also wondered if the whole specially raising starters thing has something to do with the universal 87.5:12.5 male/female gender ratio they seem to have. Like if that's not their natural gender ratio, but merely the ratio that they're given out at.

I'm just about finished the Elgyem line. Next project: Timburr.

For Charmander, I answered that by assuming that, like many reptiles, their gender is determined by the incubation temperature. In their case, a relatively narrow incubation range selects for females. Charizard can easily maintain incubation temperatures to ensure an even population distribution, but an amateur trainer/breeder isn't usually going to be so attentive.

that's kinda what I'm saying though. What if the breeders responsible for distributing charmanders deliberately incubate them at the temperatures needed to get that gender ratio? I'm not sure why they'd do that, but yeah.

^ To prevent the proliferation of (*insert starter here*) breeders, of course.

edited 10th Mar '11 12:19:07 PM by TracerBullet