Roleplay / Pokemon Battle-By-Post

Welcome trainers to Smogon's CAP ASB League! Here we strive to make a welcoming, fun, and challenging game for you to enjoy as a spectator or, hopefully, a participant.

The ultimate goal of BBP (at the time it was called Anime-Style Battling), when still in its beta stages.

This forum roleplay was created in February 2011 on the Smogon forums by Deck Knight to keep the CAP forum active during the downtime caused during the Generation IV to Generation V transition. The spinoff game eventually became VERY popular and eventually became active enough to be moved to the resident game forum where it lives to this day. Deck Knight maintained the game until his retirement in early 2015, where the game is now maintained by the several moderators who moderate the forum.

A typical BBP match involves players sending out at first before making orders. Orders consist of two to three actions (depending on format) which are generally using a move or command and substitutions that allow for alteration of orders in the case of a specific order or outcome happening. Because of the forum nature, players take turns to order so those who order first are inherently at a disadvantage when the second order player can take full advantage of whatever the first order player does. After orders are made, the referee of the match will interpret both player's orders and then calculate the results of the round before posting it. Then the battlers point out errors the referee made generally for their benefit. This repeats until a winner is found.

BBP is a lot different to other Pokémon forum-based simulators in that it is far less flavor-driven and more mechanics-driven and dictated by numbers and objectivity.

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Tropes pertaining to the BBP Game System

Gameplay Tropes

Tropes relating to the gameplay itself.

• Combination Attack: The combination system in BBP. Instead of two Pokémon using different attacks to make a more powerful single attack, it is one Pokémon combining two moves to make a new move, either a more powerful version of a single move (same move combinations) or combining two different moves for a different effect. However, this usually lowers the move's priority and leaves the Pokémon a sitting duck the next action, not to mention it usually eats up a LOT of energy.

• Damn You, Muscle Memory!: A policy change meant most Toggle Abilities which were off by default became on by default. Cue the rage from users toggling their abilities only to realize they are turning the abilities off when they meant on.
• Early-Installment Weirdness: Look at today's battles and then look at the battles back in 2011. The rules were far more looser back then and there were lots of different mechanics to today. Even infinite substitutions that were all legal no matter what for the first couple of months.
• Extrinsic Go-First Rule: Generally either through a coinflip or some preset criteria. However, no one generally wants to order first because the second order in a round is generally more advantageous...
  • Or in the case of PM orders matches, this trope is completely averted as there is no turn order.

• Nerf: Anything (usually a move, ability, or item) that becomes too good in BBP is usually subjected to this through BBP’s Policy System. A couple of examples are listed:
  • Endeavor used to be able to combine with itself to deal massive damage to the opponent and even KO an opponent for a miniscule required energy cost relative to the final energy cost (which was usually enough to KO the user). The move was nerfed by adding a must have enough energy clause which outright destroyed the viability of the combination. The move was then later nerfed again after more complaints arose to have the damage dealt reduced, the energy cost bumped up, and the ability to use it in combinations banned.
  • Pain Split at first was a very powerful move that easily equalized any HP Gap no matter how large it was. Pain Split has been largely nerfed over time with a cap in the amount of HP siphoned introduced, a must have enough energy clause to stop last ditch attacks and an increased Energy Cost.
• One-Hit Kill:
  • Averted, for the most part. It is very hard to perform a move that one-shots a Pokémon in one hit in BBP. Furthermore, the One-Hit Kill moves in the games have been converted to simply high-powered attacks with shakier accuracy than Zap Cannon and friends, and No Guard does not work with such moves.
  • If you are facing a Pokémon with a 4x weakness to Ground or Ice and manage to guarantee the hit, this trope could be played straight. For example, a Sheer Cold and Blizzard Combination under Hail will likely one-shot anything 4× weak to Ice, especially if Helping Hand is involved.
  • The only other time this trope will usually play straight is when a player takes advantage of their opponent's Attack! Attack! Attack! strategy to use a move such as Bide, turning their offensive into a powerful retaliation that one-shots them.
• Scratch Damage: The lowest amount of damage one can inflict with a damaging attack is 1. Anything less than that, assuming the target is not immune, automatically rounds to 1.
• Useless Useful Spell: Stat Manipulation (excluding damaging boosters), because they generally do not make up for the lost action using them most of the time. Add to that a mechanic that makes boosts/drops decay and there is even less worth using them. Swords Dance for example is +4 DMG for Physical Attacks. There are however, some Pokémon that can take advantage of stat manipulation:
  • Swoobat can take advantage of Simple Calm Mind to have access to a 26 BAP Stored Power after three actions, allowing it to nuke anything in sight. Anything with Stored Power and a move like Calm Mind or Work Up can also do this with a Macho Brace on.
  • Volbeat can equip a Power Lens and then use Tail Glow to have access to a priority +6 Sp. Attack boosting move. It can then use the boost to either wreak havoc on the opponent or even pass it to a team mate... Anything with Tail Glow can do this as well.
  • Speed boosting moves are not bad either, albeit niche. An Agility allowing you to outspeed your opponent when combined with moves like Bounce and Dig can really play havoc with the opponent when they least expect it.

Pokémon Tropes

Tropes relating to Pokémon in BBP.

• Adaptational Badass: Several Pokémon that suffer in competitive battles are found to be very powerful with CAP BBP’s mechanics. Aggron is a prime example: held back in normal competitive battles because its slowness tends to let it get One-Hit KOed before pulling off a Rock Head Head Smash, in bbp, Aggron gains the benefit of Sturdy along with Head Smash and it is much harder to One-Hit KO any Pokémon.

• Joke Character: Wobbuffet, who, unlike in-game, is terrible in BBP. Taunt makes its supportive moves go away, reducing it to Counter, Mirror Coat, Bide, and Struggle, all of which can be dealt with through the use of Substitutions, being a physically-based Ghost-type, a specially-based Dark-type, or being Sableye / Spiritomb. Not even its signature Lax Incense saves it from being one of the worst fully-evolved Pokémon in BBP.
• Lethal Joke Character:
  • Delibird, given its status as a Joke Character in-game. Due to the Vital Spirit/Insomnia interaction, Delibird had an innate +1 Accuracy and Evasion. This turned hitting Delibird into a Luck-Based Mission while the plucky bird could pepper its opposition with Blizzards and Hustle-boosted attacks without any worries. With an Everstone, Delibird became an even deadlier threat and was even used to beat a gym once! Delibird was since nerfed to have a +1 Attack, Defense and Sp. Defense rank instead of a +1 Evasion boost and it is still a legitimate threat.
  • Smeargle also counts as well. While it has terrible base stats, its ability to learn every move in the game makes it an absolute nightmare to play against when properly trained. Have fun ordering against something with well over 600 moves at its disposal.
• Magikarp Power: More Pokémon start out playing this trope straight. Some Pokémon start out with very small movepools, and must build up to become more powerful. The Trope Namer is still this, but compared to the main games, it is far better off, gaining access to Bubble, Hydro Pump, and Reversal.
• One Stat to Rule Them All:
  • HP, simply because it helps the Pokémon win more damage races by virtue of being able to take more hits. At least most of the Pokémon with high HP are balanced out with generally mediocre stats elsewhere.
  • Movepool is also this because more moves equates to more options equates to more ways to screw the opponent over. It is also why a Smeargle is a legitimate threat when properly trained and why Wobbuffet is largely considered one of the worst fully evolved Pokémon in BBP.

Tropes pertaining to BBP’s Roleplays

BBP Raid Zone Tropes

The BBP Raid Zone is one of BBP's many roleplays that provides an endgame source for using Pokémon. Created by user zarator, the idea of the roleplay is for two players to enter a raid and beat several bosses that are controlled by a manual AI system used by the referee. Victory gives standard counters and a bunch of items designed exclusively for use within the roleplay. The roleplay itself comes with an accompanying story that many people pay attention to and follow, being emotive at every twist and turn the story has. This folder has tropes related to the BBP Raid Zone. More to be added.

• Contractual Boss Immunity: All bosses in the BBP Raid Zone are immune to a metric ton of moves, the list of moves too large to list here.

• Difficulty Levels: Each raid can be done in two separate difficulties: Normal Mode and Hard Mode.
  • Normal Mode has the two players bring two Pokémon each which makes it harder to build a team for but the fights are generally easier.
  • Hard Mode has the two players bring four Pokémon each which makes it easier to build a team for but the fights are a lot harder due to a few new tricks the bosses get.
• Dual Boss: Weavile + Froslass in Frozen Vault, Ho-Oh + Lugia in Eye of the Storm, and Valaun + Revenankh in Shrine of the Old Gods are examples of this.
• Flunky Boss: Lots of bosses in the BBP Raid Zone will summon Add's or other lackeys to help them in their quest to make you and your partner lose.

• Light Is Not Good: Played with, given that the Raid Zone has the BBP-exclusive Light-type. Valaun is a straight example but there are a few inverted examples with a Syclar who knows a couple of Light-type moves from Raging Shore and then later the first Light-type ally with a special Dragonair as a reward for beating Flower Paradise on hard.
• Mind Rape: The battle against Regigigas involves a specific Sanity stat that can be lowered by several abilities of Regigigas or its tentacles. If a Pokémon's Sanity reaches zero, they go insane and begin attacking their former allies.
• Non-Indicative Difficulty: Many people claimed that it was easier to do a raid in Hard Mode than Normal Mode because it was much easier to teambuild with eight Pokémon instead of four (mainly, a dedicated cleric or two can be run and not be deadweight) and the fights being not that hard relative to normal. Of course zarator was not exactly happy and this has been averted as a result from Hour of Twilight onwards.

• Shielded Core Boss: Zapdos, Raikou, Kyogre, and Shaymin all have shields that are active at the start or thrown up mid-battle.
  • Zapdos and Shaymin constantly summon lackeys while their shields are up but when gone, start using more dangerous attacks.
  • Kyogre's Shield constantly regenerates its health until broken with one of the many Icicle Spines given to you. While this does a lot of damage, it triggers a powerful attack that drains loads of energy which may result in a Total Party Kill if the raid is reckless with their energy. At least the surviving members get their energy back eventually.
  • Raikou when throwing up its shield forces you to disperse it AND attack it in a round to avoid it blowing the raid to bits in a single blow. At least you have a ball that while has been damaging you, can be thrown to almost decapitate the shield in one hit.
• Shout-Out: zarator admitted that he drew heavy inspiration from World of Warcraft when he made the BBP Raid Zone.
• Tactical Suicide Boss: Some bosses in the BBP Raid Zone rely on you taking advantage of certain effects induced by the boss in order to defeat them. A couple of examples are below:
  • The Suicune encounter periodically drains life from all Pokémon to heal itself. However, if the Pokémon have the Liquid Ooze ability or are tainted with a debuff used by one of the Add's summoned by the boss, the massive amounts of recovery that Suicune would get ends up turning into Suicune losing a massive amount of health in one attack.
  • The Pyroak encounter sees a Slugma spawn every now and then. When these Pokémon find themselves on low enough health, they blow up, damaging all Pokémon and causing them to take increased damage for a short time. Even Pyroak itself is not immune, giving players a chance to hurt it significantly while it is weakened by the explosion.
• This Looks Like a Job for Aquaman:
  • Invoked and Enforced in some cases, as the BBP Raid Zone encourages players to buy Pokémon just to win them.
  • Some Pokémon (such as Dedenne and Ariados) that are otherwise useless in BBP are given massive buffs through signature artifacts that make them viable in select encounters and generally useful.
• Time-Limit Boss:
  • Many bosses since the first expansion have a time limit to win before they either go beserk, wiping your party in a matter of actions, or something happens and you lose.
  • Central Processing is the only raid so far with a true time limit with the team required to win in fifteen rounds before the place blows up. While this isn't much of an issue if you just want to win the raid, this will come into play if the players go for the "battery run", requiring them to beat more enemies in order to win.

The Legend Run Tropes

The Legend Run is one of BBP's endgame roleplays where the aim of the game is to enter a dungeon and capture the Legendary Pokémon. Created by Deck Knight, the roleplay is now maintained by Dogfish 44 and Its_A_Random. The Legend Run is notorious for being difficult and also utilises in-game items such as Poké Balls and Potions which are not utilized elsewhere in BBP. Not all Legendary Pokémon are released as of yet. Oddly enough, dungeons themselves are commonly referred to as TLR's by the playerbase. The Legend Run has examples of the following tropes:

• Anti-Frustration Features: After complaints of difficulty, these were added. Combination timers preventing the usage of combinations, the introduction of one-time save points for challenges that go awry, and a HP-based capture system are examples of these.
• Boring, but Practical: Heal Pulse stall strategies. Very safe and multiple Heal Pulse users can help a team go through a long TLR without too much difficulties, but it is also slow and do not be surprised if you bore the unfortunate soul who agreed to referee your TLR to death.
• Broken Bridge: Played Straight for Timeless Tower's Heaven's Ascent dungeon and Ruined Eden's Tower of Ash dungeon. In both cases the player must reach the bosses of the other three dungeons in that TLR to be able to enter.
• Difficulty Levels: The Legend Run has three difficulty levels depending on the dungeon:
  • Training: These dungeons have the smallest bag but are the shortest dungeons—forgoing the Lackeys—and generally easy. Only AZ's Floette and Phione are currently attainable through these.
  • Legendary: The most common and standard difficulty level. These are of "standard" length and have intermediate-sized bags.
  • Uber: These have the largest bags and allow a fourth Pokémon to be brought but these house the major legendaries and are generally either very long or very hard. Only the best win on this difficulty.
  • Almaz Mine has Difficulty Levels for the whole dungeon which allows the player to take on the dungeon in Normal Mode or Hard Mode. Hard Mode offers more rewards but is a lot harder than Normal Mode with different encounters and traps calling for reinforcements. Fun.
  • The Planet's Fury does something similar to the above but only for the boss battle. Justified because the boss fight on hard offers a Soul Dew.
• Dynamic Difficulty: The Legendary difficulty Ruined Eden TLR's have this with the fourth RP trap deciding whether to make you face one or two Pokémon depending on how much HP your team has at the time.
• Flunky Boss: The Legendary Pokémon of each dungeon always has at least one lackey accompanying it.
• Hard Mode Perks: As hinted above, the higher the difficulty, the bigger the backpack you get to bring. You even get to bring a fourth Pokémon with you on the highest difficulty.

• Luck-Based Mission: Winning in the Legend Run was formerly this due to captures being based on referee-controlled RNG. This capture system was replaced in the new generation with a HP-based capture system where capture occurs when the player reduces a Pokémon's Capture HP to zero.
• Nerf: Happened to Heal Ball soon after the roleplay was launched to the masses because it had five times the normal capture rate on Pokémon with half or less HP and fully healed the Pokémon on capture, a big deal in The Legend Run.
• Nintendo Hard: Invoked, according to Word of God. Later played with: it was noticed that only a half-dozen people, at best, had obtained available Legendary Pokémon, and they were all of Phione, Regirock, Registeel, or Regice. A change in the capture system, combined with simplifying several of the Legend Runs, has made it easier for trainers to get the legends, though it is still no means a pushover.

Character tropes

Tropes pertaining to the characters within the roleplay.

• The Ace: Frosty is one of the top players in BBP, having at least 15 badges under his belt, as well as having come in second in the Lore, Legends, And More Action tournament, and having caught a legendary Pokemon.
• Berserk Button: For Texas Cloverleaf, the ability Rivalry was this in the past. Most users who challenged his gym deliberately brought Female Pokémon to take advantage of his Male Haxorus. Then someone brought a Nidoking to his Gym which has Rivalry. And it made the difference resulting in a KO to one of his Pokémon before it could use a Combination Attack. Texas' reaction? He raged and then hotfixed Rivalry to have no effect because it is a "fucking bullshit ability". This was later changed to just making the ability have no debuff.
• Big "NO!": Part of Onion Bubs' !no script, where it simulates a man falling off the cliff no by going on for eternity until hitting the ground.
  Onion Bubs: Never, not in a million years, absolutely not, no way Jose, no chance Lance, nyet, negatory, mm-mm, nuh-uh, uh-uh! And of course my own personal favourite of all time, man falling off of a cliff: NNNOOOOOOOOOoooooooo.......
• Big "YES!": Part of Onion Bubs' !yes script, where it simulates a man winning the lottery yes by going on for eternity until running out of breath.
  Onion Bubs: Always, yes in a million years, absolutely so, yes way Jose, yes chance Lance, dah, affirmitive, mm-hmm, yuh-huh, uh-huh! And of course my own personal favourite of all time, man winning the lottery: YYYEEEEEEEEEssssssss.......
• Butt-Monkey: Galladiator's main defining trait was his knack for constantly losing battles, occasionally through incredibly contrived ways.
• Catchphrase:
  • Onion Bubs has several:
    • "Onion Bubs is in da house!" - Its typical greet.
    • "Ouch, that hurt." - In response to being kicked from the chat.
    • "Hey, that's my line!" - If someone typed ... pff or ... sss before it could.
    • "I give x a y out of 10 right now." - When asked to rate something through the !rate command.
    • "Yo x, y wants you in #channel so get on over there!" - When asking someone to get over to a specific channel.
    • "BOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOM! The bomb explodes in <user>'s face. ^_^" - When Onion Bubs' bomb detonates on someone in its !bombgame.
  • S 0 L 1 D G 0 LD's catchphrases:
    • "!recap" - Due to his bad connection he will use this bot command to find out what he missed while he was disconnected.
    • "Anyone flash?" - Always looking for a fight when he comes on IRC.
    • "DC Check" - Justified since he suffers from a bad internet connection.
• The Chessmaster: Its_A_Random has managed to calculate out entire Normal Mode raids before they even happen including expected time of victories in the past and carried those plans out to success, most notably the Shaymin and Pyroak encounters. Even minor bumps did not stop him from not carrying out those plans (with a willing partner) move for move.
• Cluster F-Bomb: Colossoils's reaction to a challenger winning a Bronze Rank Battle Pike with him refereeing was to yell FUCK roughly 2287 times in a row in the same paragraph as well as some self-deprecation full of expletives.
• Crazy-Prepared: During the Water-type qualifiers where it was decided who would become BBP's Water-type Gym Leader, Athenodoros wrote out a substitution that covered a lot of possibilities of what his opponent might do.
• Demon Lords and Archdevils: While no Archdevil has been seen, there are currently three Demon Lords on Eternal Drifter's team: Itsumo the Spiritomb, Demon Lord of Destruction, Kyofu the Tyranitar, Demon Lord of Tyranny, and Goumon the Houndoom, Demon Lord of Pain.
• Dishing Out Dirt:
  • akela and Leethoof were both rock-type gym leaders.
  • Deck Knight specialized in Ground-types. Was a candidate for the Ground-type gym, only to lose to Its_A_Random.
• Extra-ore-dinary: Complications, C$FP, and tavok specialized in steel-type pokemon.
• Gotta Catch Them All: akela's stated goal; he aims to own every Pokémon in BBP. As of this edit, he has over 250 different Pokémon.
• Hipster:
  • Leethoof used Aerodactyl and Musharna before they became cool. Sadly his Bastiodon innovations are yet to catch on.
  • Matezoide is infamous for using Pokémon no one else uses and being successful. He did not make the finals of a Tournament for nothing. Only a few of the Pokémon he uses has become cool since.
• An Ice Person:
  • waterwarrior focuses on Ice-type Pokémon. He formerly controlled the BBP Ice-type Gym before resigning.
  • Glacier Knight specialized in the ice type when not advancing his stories. He was even a canidate for the Ice-type Gym.
• Insistent Terminology: Gerard calls the Psychic-type Psyquic, much to the ire of others.
• In-Universe Nickname: Rainman Legends is often simply referred to as Rainman.
• Large Ham: Everything has to be over the top with Glacier.
  Glacier: OH FUCK I MISSED LEETHOOF NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!
• Making a Splash: Athenodoros was once the Water-type Gym Leader in BBP.
• Non-Elemental: Maxim's specialty. He's the Normal-type Gym Leader in BBP.
• Nonindicative Name:
  • It is very ironic that a user with a name like Frosty once led BBP's Fire-type gym, only to quit so he can go for the Ice-type gym.
  • You might think with a name like 'waterwarrior', he'd focus on Water-types. His specialization is instead Ice-type Pokémon.
• Playing with Fire: Flamestrike and MK Ultra specialize in the fire-type.
• Psychic Powers: Gerard's specialty. He controls the Psychic-type gym in BBP.
• Poisonous Person: Engineer Pikachu was the Gym Leader of the Poison-type Gym in BBP until he was booted out for inactivity.
• Running Gag: Many people have difficulties tagging S0L1D G0LD, so they usually do not bother tagging him properly. akela once typed Solid Fuck You instead of tagging him.
• Shock and Awe: Dogfish 44's specialty. He even controls the Electric-type gym in BBP.
• Shout-Out: Onion Bubs was named after a Homestar Runner character.
• Too Dumb to Live: Maxim had one of these when participating in an explorative RP with fellow users akela and Rainman Legends. There was a branch just sitting there waiting to be taken and surrounding bushes. The three had been alerted to by akela's Pinsir that there was a slight stir in the bushes indicating an obvious trap. Surely you should disarm the trap first? Instead, Maxim went in and took the branch anyway, springing a trap that made running away next to impossible and [[TotalPartyKill got the whole team eventually killed as a result. At least he had the decency to forfeit before it actually happened.
  Maxim: Grab the golden branch, springing a trap that's sure to kill us all!
  Two rounds of being destroyed by wild Pokémon later...
  Maxim: When did this place start kicking my butt?! Screw this, even if we manage to beat these two the boss is going to murder us. I'm out of here.
  Rainman Legends: So we can agree that Maxim is a dolt for doing this, whatever.
  akela: I knew you were going to get us killed, Maxim.
• Verbal Tic: VirajVora always ended his sentences with ellipses... EVEN WHEN SHOUTING... Few users in the userbase liked it...