A concept can only take you so far, but to be fair, this one is a really terrific concept; an express Pokémon parody within D&D. And to what extent this module succeeds, it's all because of the attention to detail within the concept.
All the monsters are divided into 'types' with each type being strong to another type and weak to a third? Check! Pokéballs? You know it! A finale involving a clear parody of Team Rocket? Of course! A story award called 'Caught 'em all!' and another called 'The Very Best'? Almost! (Seriously, the name of that second story award really is a missed opportunity.) A reference to the trading card game? You'd better believe it!
The laughs come well in this module, and that's the best thing about it. Anyone who has played or watched Pokémon as a kid is going to at least smile out of recognition at a lot of these tropes and honestly, that ain't nothing. This module leaves an impact, and that's something that many can't say.
But, unfortunately, it can't quite turn it into an engaging experience.
For starters, many players are simply going to be flummoxed by the capture experience. Even after cajoling, hinting and trying anything I could to teach my players that they could literally use any technique to capture monsters, players either fell into using the same trick every time, or just fighting when they couldn't think of a trick. And while I know the module offers some tricks for running Pokemon battles simultaneously, it forces the players to choose between something that feels like Pokemon but fails to be fun, or something that doesn't but still isn't that much better. It's not a surprise that the game mostly comes alive in its traditional battle sequences vs. the Wayseekers and Team Shade.
It's not a terrible module, and one out of the two times I ran it it went great. But this is a module for a very specific group of people. I love it, but I do not blame people for whom it falls flat.
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