Chapter 11: Equipment & Items

Basics

Pokemon Trainers that wander off into the wilderness ill-prepared typically have short journeys. There are many items that are vital to the success of any Trainer’s adventures. Level 1 Trainers start off with 200 to spend as they see fit, unless their Class choices state otherwise. 

Currencies

There are 2 kinds of currencies in the Pokemon world: Poke-dollars () and Poke-Crystals (), or ‘P-Crystals’. 

• Poke-dollars are the most common currency, which pay for the vast majority of purchases a regular person might make in a lifetime. Almost everything except for the most fabulous or rare items can be bought with .
• The most valuable purchases are made with P-Crystals, a rare resource created when a Pokemon reaches Tier 3 or 4, as their newfound power overflows and crystallizes into a solid form. These sought-after crystals are named due to their similarities to Z-Crystals, except P-Crystals are even more versatile – they are not used to temporarily bolster a Pokemon’s combat ability, but are instead raw sources of vast energy. A single P-Crystal can power a million-person city for a month. 

Poke-dollars cannot be exchanged for P-Crystals, and vice versa. Someone who has access to P-Crystals typically has either more money than they know what to do with, or something far more valuable than money that they could get for their P-Crystals. For example, nobody walks around with the necessary hundreds of thousands of dollars to purchase a Master Ball in cash, and even if they did, the seller would want a P-Crystal in exchange since the process used to create a Master Ball requires one. If they had any intentions of continuing their business, they would want a steady supply of P-Crystals, not money. 

• Many high-level Pokemon are actually drawn towards P-Crystals, seeking to consume them for power. Tier 3 or 4 Pokemon are actually capable of eating P-Crystals to grow stronger (see Vitamins below for details). Because of this, people who have P-Crystals either use/trade them quickly or are personally strong enough to not be deterred by such powerful opposition. 
• Note: A Pokemon does not gain any benefit from consuming the P-Crystals it creates, as the energy within the P-Crystal is identical to that of the Pokemon’s evolutionary line. It must eat one created by a different Pokemon line. Regional variants, such as Vulpix and Alolan Vulpix, may consume each other’s P-Crystals.

Your Inventory

• Unfortunately, you can’t just hide away everything you own in an indeterminate portal dimension until you can actually afford one. The amount of items that you can actively carry on your person depends on your Power capability, see below.
• Items come in 2 weights: Negligible and Weighty. Negligible items weigh so little that you can effectively carry as many as you want. Weighty items are heavy enough that you need to consider it when packing for adventure. You can carry a # of Weighty Items equal to twice your Power rating.
  • Carrying more than this amount causes you to be within your Heavy Lifting range. Carrying more than 3 times your Power rating causes you to be within your Staggering range. You simply cannot carry more than 4 times your Power rating.
  • The Superpowered Capability increases these limits by 100% – a Superpowered Trainer with 8 Power has a carrying capacity of 32 Weight before they enter their Heavy Lifting range! 
  • Holding too many Negligible items will cause them to instead be Weighty. This is denoted below as “N-12”. This means the item is of Negligible weight, but having more than 12 of them causes it to be Weighty. If you had more than 24 of them, it would count as 2 separate items that are Weighty. 
  • Some items are especially heavy and count as 2 Weighty Items. Heavy Armor is the most immediate example of this. This is denoted below as “W-2”.
  • Yes, this counts the equipment you are wearing, too.
• Humans make better use of equipment to enhance their combat capabilities than Pokemon do. Trainers have 1 Body Slot, 2 Hand Slots, and 3 Accessory Slots. Pokemon have 1 Body Slot and 1 Accessory Slot. Some items (usually Two-Handed Weapons) require multiple slots to equip.
  • Items that give the same effect do not stack! If you have armor that gives you +2 Default DEF CS and a shield that gives you +1 Default DEF CS, then you only get the larger bonus. They do not add together! Don’t fucking do it!

Crafting

• All items have a Quality, which determines how difficult it is to craft. Quality usually, but not always, corresponds with an item’s rarity and price. Quality ranges from 0-4. Items with a base Quality of Masterwork or higher are bought and/or made with P-Crystals. 

Quality Rank	Item Quality	Creation DC Range
0	Standard Quality	8-10
1	Fine Quality	11-13
2	Expert Quality	14-16
3	Masterwork Quality	17-19
4	Legendary Quality	20-22

• Items are Easy, Medium, or Hard to craft, and this is reflected in each item’s description. For example, a Potion is a 0 Quality (E) item. This means that it is of Standard Quality and is Easy to craft. See Crafting for details.
  Because of how simple and easy it is to create them, there are typically few Potion shortages in the Pokemon World. Repels, however, are 0 Quality (M) items and are slightly harder to make, resulting in a higher price and lowered production. (H) items are the hardest to craft in their Quality, and have the highest prices and could be rare enough to appear in select stores.
  • An item’s price depends more on its Quality than how difficult it is to make.
• GMs should keep in mind that items should be common at their respective Tiers, but higher Quality items should be more difficult to find. For example, Potions might appear often in dungeons or wild areas at Tier 1, only to generally be replaced by Super Potions at Tier 2. However, this ties into adventure and campaign design, so as to feel less contrived. 

Items & Lifestyle

Trainers typically try to maintain as high of a Lifestyle as they are able to, as few people willingly become homeless. Younger or less skilled Trainers may find themselves living with roommates, or even staying with family, which can help mitigate Lifestyle costs. 

• A Trainer’s Lifestyle ranges from 0-4 and determines what kind of item they may retroactively procure once per day. A Trainer can say they previously purchased a General Item of a Quality equal to their Lifestyle – 1. For example, someone with a Middle Class Lifestyle can spontaneously pull a Potion out of their backpack, but couldn’t generate anything else that day. This item is assumed to come from the cost of the Trainer’s Lifestyle and is effectively “free”, so get one every day if you can. 
• You lose access to the item if your Lifestyle decreases. Someone with a High Class Lifestyle could pull out a Bike, but it would either be sold off or tragically destroyed if they became Middle Class. This does not happen if you actually pay for a specific item, instead of retroactively gaining it through your Lifestyle.

Buying & Selling Items

The value listed in the charts below show an item’s Base Value, or how much it is worth on the market under normal circumstances. An item may be purchased for 100% of its Base Value or sold to a store for 50% of its Base Value. Note that selling an item is not the same as refunding one you already bought. Items are typically created at 25% of their Base Value, so it can be profitable to sell your creations.

• An item’s Base Value may be modified depending on the item’s Demand. The more people that want to buy an item, the higher its price rises, and vice versa. An Item either has Very High, High, Regular, Low, or Very Low Demand.
  • Very High Demand sets an item’s Base Value to 200%, meaning it may be sold for 100% of its Base Value.
  • High Demand sets an item’s Base Value to 150%, meaning it may be sold for 75% of its Base Value.
  • Regular Demand does not change an item’s Base Value.
  • Low Demand sets an item’s Base Value to 50%, meaning it may be sold for 25% of its Base Value.
  • Very Low Demand sets an item’s Base Value to 25%. People will not buy items from you if they are this unwanted.
• For example, regular Pokeballs are one of the most commonly available items in the Pokemon universe, but are usually sold at Regular Demand for 20. Circumstances such as a strike at the Pokeball factory could lower Pokeball production, resulting in fewer of them on the market, warranting them becoming High Demand and being sold for 30. Alternatively, the factory may have accidentally exceeded production, flooding the market with Pokeballs and making them Low Demand, at which point they would cost 15. Given that regular Pokeballs can be created for as low as 10, waiting until High Demand means they could sell them for 15, resulting in a profit of5 per ball.
• When selling items to individuals and not stores, keep in mind how much they want the item and how far they’re willing to go to buy it. Most collectors will happily pay Very High Demand prices to expand their collection.
• Certain Class Features can get select items for cheaper than usual, resulting in them being treated as 1 Demand lower than they really are. This is also a good way to simulate a discount from a favorable merchant… or be inverted to represent a price hike from a mean seller.

The Pokedex

• Pokedex technology has come a long way in the past few years, and now they’re more advanced than ever! It effectively operates as a smartphone, coming with an advanced camera and image recognition software, as well as connection to the internet and the ability to operate as an actual phone, too. You can install other apps on them to improve functionality, such as flashlights and recording software.
  • A Pokedex is an Expert Quality (H) item that normally costs 10,000 or more. Fortunately, most Trainers receive one for free when given their first Pokemon, as the cost is subsidized through the government, whatever form that may take. Losing that free Pokedex doesn’t entitle you to another one, so hang onto it.